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Greenlanders Reject Trump With 85% Against Joining US

(Berlingske and Sermitsiaq newspa)

(Bloomberg) -- Greenland’s population is overwhelmingly against leaving the Danish realm in favor of the US, dealing a blow to President Donald Trump’s insistence the island is keen to join.

A Verian poll, commissioned by Danish newspaper Berlingske and Greenland’s Sermitsiaq publication, showed 85% of the population on the self-ruling Arctic territory don’t want to be part of the US. About 6% said they’d prefer the country over Denmark and 9% were undecided, according to the survey published Tuesday. 

Trump insists he wants to take over the world’s largest island for security reasons and has refused to rule out using force. The president has also argued Greenland’s population would prefer to be part of the US. His interest in the territory stems from his first term in office.

“The people of Greenland are not happy with Denmark,” Trump said Jan. 21. “You know, I think they’re happy with us.”

That view is not shared by Greenland’s leaders, many of whom are instead pushing for independence. While the island is part of the Kingdom of Denmark, its 57,000 inhabitants have extensive home rule.

“We don’t want to be Danish, we don’t want to be American, we of course want to be Greenlandic,” the territory’s prime minister, Mute B. Egede, said recently.

Meanwhile, Denmark is doing its best to navigate the spat with Trump. Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen earlier on Tuesday worked to drum up support from European allies with a whirlwind tour of Berlin, Paris and Berlin, seeking to project unity while avoiding antagonizing the US president.

Commenting on the survey, Denmark’s Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said it is a “clear signal” of what Greenlanders don’t want.

“This aligns with the impression I have from conversations with Greenlandic colleagues and friends,” Rasmussen said in an emailed statement on Wednesday. “The decision about Greenland’s future must be made by the Greenlandic people.” He added that Denmark’s government wants to “develop and not dismantle” the Danish kingdom.

A majority of Danes want to keep Greenland in the union, though they generally find it fitting for the territory to put its independence to a vote in a referendum within the next five years, according to another recent survey in Denmark.

Greenlanders have previously indicated they prefer to form closer ties with Iceland and Canada, according to a December study by the University of Greenland. Denmark ranked third among the countries the territory wants to cooperate more with, while the US was fourth.

The Verian poll had 497 interviews conducted on the internet Jan. 22-26, including a representative sample of Greenlandic citizens aged 18 or older. Statistical uncertainty on the responses is about 3.1 percentage points. 

The poll also showed 45% of Greenlanders view Trump’s interest in Greenland as a threat, Berlingske said. Only about 8% would take a US passport if they had to make an instant choice between Danish and US citizenship, according to the newspaper.

(Adds comment from foreign minister from eighth paragraph, details from other polls from 10th)

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