ANKARA, Turkey — Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen declared at a NATO summit on Wednesday that her country would defend its territory as President Donald Trump revived his longtime demand for control of Greenland.
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Earlier this year, Trump sharply raised tensions with allies and seemed to push NATO to a breaking point with his threats to seize Greenland, the vast Arctic expanse that is an autonomous territory of Denmark.
Allies stood up to the president and Trump backed down, saying at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that he had reached the framework of a deal brokered by NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte.
But almost as soon as he arrived to meet NATO counterparts in Turkey, Trump restarted the fight, telling reporters that Greenland “should be controlled by the United States, not by Denmark.”
Trump added that European refusal to accept this is “what hurt my relationship with NATO.”
On Wednesday, sitting alongside Rutte, Trump dispelled hopes that this was an offhand remark and said he planned to use the NATO meeting to “relay my problems.”
“Greenland is a big problem for us,” he added. “Greenland is very important for the U.S. but it’s not important for Denmark.”
Leaders in Denmark and Greenland staunchly opposed Trump’s demands. Frederiksen in recent months has said that she didn’t believe the ordeal was truly over, after Rutte’s proposal to assuage Trump by increasing the NATO and U.S. military presence in the Arctic.
Trump’s comments in the Turkish capital took aback some European officials who had expected him to use the summit of NATO’s 32 nations to focus instead on his grievances about their criticism of his war with Iran war or about military spending by European nations.
Frederiksen, arriving at the summit on Wednesday, said the “U.S. position is unfortunately very clear on this topic and our position is as clear as it has been all through: Greenland is of course not for sale.”
“We are a sovereign state,” she told reporters, “and we need everybody to respect our territorial integrity.”
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Asked if Denmark would defend its territory from friend or foe alike, Frederiksen said, “Of course we will defend the kingdom of Denmark.”
The Danish leader also reiterated that NATO was meant to ensure allies help defend each other from outside threats.
“One of the reasons we built NATO many many years ago is if anything happens to one of us then everybody should stand up,” she said, referring to the alliance’s collective defense pledge. “I mean, Article 5, is our insurance … and the same goes for Greenland if anything happens in our direction.”
Some European officials say Trump’s public skepticism about defending U.S. allies has spurred a reckoning over Article 5, the mutual defense clause in NATO’s founding treaty, which says that an attack against one should be considered an attack on all.
Sitting next to Trump on Wednesday, Rutte again sought to de-escalate, reminding the president that the two had “made a deal” on Greenland, and insisting that he would “make sure that deal is step-by-step being implemented.”
The NATO chief has maintained that there is a “good process in place” in negotiations between U.S., Danish and Greenlandic officials.
Technical talks began this year after Rutte defused the crisis but officials say that so far they have yielded few concrete results.
Previous talks have broached increasing the presence of U.S. troops or bases in Greenland, offering the U.S. greater access to investment in mineral extraction and boosting military operations in the Arctic, including for a multilayered air defense system called Golden Dome.
NATO officials also pledged to boost the alliance’s footprint in the Arctic to address Trump’s grievances that the vast icy territory is not well-secured, and remains vulnerable to Russia and China.
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Natalie Allison contributed to this report.
