Denmark has summoned the United States charge d’affaires for talks over Danish intelligence reports that US citizens have been conducting covert influence operations in Greenland, Denmark’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.
The diplomat was summoned on Wednesday after Denmark’s main national broadcaster reported that the government believed that at least three people with connections to Donald Trump’s administration have been carrying out covert influence operations aimed at promoting Greenland’s secession from Denmark to the United States.
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“We are aware that foreign actors continue to show an interest in Greenland and its position in the Kingdom of Denmark. It is therefore not surprising if we experience outside attempts to influence the future of the Kingdom in the time ahead,” Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said in a statement.
“Any attempt to interfere in the internal affairs of the Kingdom will of course be unacceptable,” he said, adding that he had “asked the Foreign Ministry to summon the US charge d’affaires for a meeting at the ministry”.
Since returning to the White House in January, Trump has repeatedly said the US needs the strategically located, resource-rich island semiautonomous Danish territory for security reasons, and has refused to rule out the use of force to secure it.
The majority of Greenland’s 57,000 people want to become independent from Denmark, but do not wish to become part of the United States, according to a January opinion poll.
In the wake of Trump’s proposal, Denmark has sought to bolster its relations with Greenland, a former colony but now a self-governing territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, rallying European support.
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In a show of solidarity, French President Emmanuel Macron visited Greenland in June and was greeted by hundreds of locals. That contrasted with the reception received by US Vice President JD Vance in March, when protests forced him to visit a remote US airbase and scrap plans for his wife to attend a dogsled race.
Denmark’s national security and intelligence service, PET, said in a statement it considers “that Greenland, especially in the current situation, is a target for influence campaigns of various kinds”.
“This could be done by exploiting existing or invented disagreements, for example, in connection with known single issues or by promoting or reinforcing certain views in Greenland regarding the Kingdom of Denmark and the United States or other countries with a special interest in Greenland,” it said.
Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen has previously called for increased Arctic defence collaboration with the US, and firmly dismissed Washington’s desire to annex the territory.
“If you want to be more present in Greenland, Greenland and Denmark is ready and if you would like to strengthen the security in the Arctic just like us, then let us do it together,” Frederiksen said in April.
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