Denmark welcomes tweaks to US team Greenland visit

Denmark yesterday welcomed a US decision to confine a planned visit to Greenland to a military base after the plans triggered a spat between Copenhagen and the White House amid President Donald Trump's interest in taking over the island.

Denmark's prime minister had said on Tuesday that a planned visit by Usha Vance, the wife of US Vice President JD Vance, to a popular dog-sled race in Greenland this week was part of an "unacceptable pressure" on the semi-autonomous Danish territory.

The White House on Tuesday announced that the delegation would instead be headed by JD Vance himself, but that it would only visit the US Space Base at Pituffik in northern Greenland and not the dog-sled race, a big annual sporting event.

"I think it's very positive that the Americans cancelled their visit to the Greenlandic society. Instead, they will visit their own base, Pituffik, and we have nothing against that," Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said.

Since Donald Trump Jr's private visit to the mineral-rich island in January, Trump has consistently talked of annexing Greenland and urged its residents to join the United States. Polls have shown that nearly all Greenlanders oppose becoming part of the United States, and anti-American protesters have recently staged some of the largest demonstrations ever seen in Greenland.

Reuters