After months of diplomatic negotiations, Greenland, Denmark, and the United States will resume formal trilateral meetings that were paused over the summer, following U.S. President Donald Trump’s shocking demand for ownership of Greenland, which challenged the national integrity of both Greenland and Denmark.
Meetings between senior officials from Greenland, Denmark, and the United States in the two forums, the Joint Committee and the Permanent Committee, are scheduled to take place in Greenland in early December.
This was confirmed by the White House in an email to Politiken.
»The Danes and Greenlanders have invited an American delegation to meetings in the Joint and Permanent Committees in Nuuk in early December,« the email states, describing diplomatic relations with Greenland and Denmark as »well-established and growing in strength.«
In reality, the relations remain dominated by the fundamental uncertainty that erupted when Donald Trump claimed last December that American »ownership and control over Greenland is an absolute necessity.«
The resumption of the meetings is seen by Ulrik Pram Gad, a senior researcher at the Danish Institute for International Studies, as an attempt to return to a form of »daily operations.« Despite the uncertainty being a new fundamental condition not only in Copenhagen and Nuuk but also in Washington, D.C., for Trump’s own Secretary of State Marco Rubio, he notes.
»There hasn’t been much to hold meetings about, because the people on the other end didn’t really know what it was about. You could get Marco Rubio to say some nice, civilized things, but no one knew whether it bore any relation to what was going on in Trump’s head. So this is an attempt to restore day-to-day business in the shadow of a fundamental uncertainty that still remains,« says Ulrik Pram Gad.
The Greenlandic government has previously expressed skepticism about resuming dialogue as long as Trump’s threats linger.
»We are ready to engage in dialogue with the U.S. on security and defense, but the condition remains that the Americans stop talking about ownership and control of Greenland,« said Vivian Motzfeldt, the minister for foreign affairs, in June to the newspaper Sermitsiaq.
Politiken asked her whether that condition has been met, but got no answer.
Politiken has learned that at a preliminary meeting in Washington, D.C., Greenland wanted to look the American officials in the eye and assess how serious they were about working together.
The Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirms to Politiken that the committees are expected to meet in December »with participation at a high official level.«
»The meetings will follow regular practice. There has been a focus on ongoing dialogue between the countries, and therefore, based on Greenland’s request, preliminary high-level official meetings were held in September before the regular meetings later in the year,« the ministry writes.
Military and Civil
The Permanent Committee was established in 1991 by Greenland’s then-home rule government and the Danish and American governments to facilitate the exchange of information regarding the U.S. military presence in Greenland. In the so-called memorandum of agreement, it was stated that the meetings should be closed and that the committee should meet regularly and at least once a year.
The framework for the U.S. military presence was agreed upon in 1951 with the defense agreement, which obligated the U.S. to assist Denmark in the defense of Greenland under NATO and simultaneously granted the U.S. free access throughout Greenland by land, sea, and air.
In 2004, Greenland, Denmark, and the U.S. also established the Joint Committee with the signing of the so-called Igaliku Agreement. The Joint Committee handles civil issues such as science, education, environment, trade, and culture.
The Image of U.S. Ambivalence
The newly appointed U.S. Ambassador, Kenneth Howery, declares in an email to Politiken that he is committed to expanding the »friendly, persistent cooperation« between the countries.
»The Joint Committee is a practical example of that commitment and remains an effective forum to strengthen our bonds and promote our shared prosperity,« he writes.
But the ambassador is the image of U.S. ambivalence. He has been specifically appointed by Trump to try to gain »ownership and control over Greenland« and has not responded to whether military force is excluded.
Recently, the White House wrote in an email to Politiken that »Greenlanders would be better served if protected by the U.S. against modern threats in the Arctic region.«
Only when Politiken followed up, asking whether the U.S. doesn’t currently feel obliged to defend Greenland, did the White House say it would »honor our commitments to Greenland.«
Faced with American ambiguity, Greenland and Denmark appear to have adopted a strategy of saying yes to what comes in a proper and respectful manner from the U.S. and no to the other, explains Ulrik Pram Gad. But they are also dependent on the U.S. For example, the Danish defense is seamlessly integrated with the American on a daily basis, he points out:
»We have to pretend that daily operations still function, and they do. It just doesn’t make the other issues go away.«
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