Nuuk [Greenland], January 16: Soldiers from France, Germany and other European countries have begun arriving in Greenland to help boost the Arctic island's security after talks involving Denmark, Greenland and the United States highlighted "fundamental disagreement" between President Donald Trump's administration and its European allies.
France has already sent 15 soldiers and Germany 13. Norway and Sweden are also participating.
The mission has been described as a recognition-of-the-territory exercise with troops to plant the European Union's flag on Greenland as a symbolic act. "The first French military elements are already en route" and "others will follow", French President Emmanuel Macron said on Wednesday as French authorities said soldiers from the country's mountain infantry unit were already in Nuuk, Greenland's capital.
France said the two-day mission is a way to show that EU troops can be quickly deployed if needed.
Meanwhile, Germany's Ministry of Defence said it was deploying a reconnaissance team of 13 personnel to Greenland on Thursday.
Al Jazeera's Natacha Butler reported from Paris that there was a "sense of urgency" among European nations.
"Particularly after the US's actions in Venezuela, a sense that when Donald Trump says something, he actually means it. And that is why we've seen a number of European countries sending troops," she said.
Denmark announced its plans to increase its own military presence in Greenland on Wednesday as the Danish and Greenlandic foreign ministers met with White House representatives in Washington, DC, to discuss Trump's intentions to take over the semiautonomous Danish territory to tap its mineral resources amid rising Russian and Chinese interest.
But the two foreign ministers emerged from the meeting with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vice President JD Vance having made little progress in dissuading Washington from seeking to take over Greenland.
"We didn't manage to change the American position," Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen told reporters. "It's clear that the president has this wish of conquering over Greenland." His Greenlandic counterpart, Vivian Motzfeldt, called for cooperation with the US but said that does not mean the country wants to be "owned by the United States".
Source: Qatar Tribune
