Denmark warns Trump to stop Greenland threats in wake of Venezuela

Sanne Wass, Bloomberg News on Jan 4, 2026

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Denmark’s prime minister urged Donald Trump to stop threatening to take control of Greenland as the U.S. president’s move to run Venezuela set alarm bells ringing in the Nordic nation about America’s military ambitions.

Mette Frederiksen’s comments came in response to Trump’s renewed assertion on Sunday that the U.S. needs Greenland, a semi-autonomous territory within the Danish kingdom, for defense purposes.

“I need to say this very directly to the U.S.,” Frederiksen said in a statement. “The U.S. has no right to annex any of the three countries of the Kingdom of Denmark.”

Frederiksen emphasized that the Danish kingdom, including Greenland, is part of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and therefore covered by the alliance’s collective defense guarantee. She also pointed to a longstanding defense agreement that gives the U.S. “extensive access to Greenland.”

Trump has repeatedly argued that U.S. control of Greenland is necessary for national security, but the move to detain Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has further heightened concerns that the U.S. would broaden its military footprint in the Western Hemisphere.

“We do need Greenland, absolutely,” Trump told The Atlantic on Sunday. “We need it for defense.”

The remarks followed a late-Saturday post on X by Katie Miller, the wife of Trump deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, showing Greenland depicted in the colors of the U.S. flag alongside the single-word caption: “SOON.”

Greenland’s Premier Jens-Frederik Nielsen in a post on Facebook earlier on Sunday called the image “disrespectful,” but said “there is no reason for panic.”

“We are a democratic society with self-government, free elections and strong institutions,” he said. “Our position is firmly anchored in international law and in internationally recognized agreements.”