NUUK: US Vice President JD Vance will visit Greenland on Friday (Mar 28) at a time when President Donald Trump is renewing his insistence that Washington should take control of the semi-autonomous Danish territory.
In a scaled-back version of a trip plan that had angered authorities in both Greenland and Denmark, Vance was expected to fly to the US military base at Pituffik in the north of the Arctic island.
Broadcaster TV2 said the delegation was scheduled to land at around 1530 GMT. Pituffik is located along the shortest route from Europe to North America and is vital for the US ballistic missile warning system.
Under the terms of a 1951 agreement, the US is entitled to visit its base whenever it wants, as long as it notifies Greenland and Copenhagen.
The initial plan had been for Vance’s wife, Usha, to visit a popular dog-sled race on the island together with national security adviser Mike Waltz, even though they were not invited by authorities in either Greenland or Denmark.
Waltz, who is facing pressure over Trump administration officials’ discussion of sensitive Houthi attack plans on the Signal messaging app, will still be on the Greenland trip, according to a White House source.
US Energy Secretary Chris Wright will also join, TV2 reported, citing anonymous sources.
Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen called the initial plans for the US visit “unacceptable”. Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen later welcomed news of the revised visit as a positive, de-escalating step.
Greenland’s acting Prime Minister Mute Egede called the visit a provocation on Monday, as the country has not yet formed a new government after a Mar 11 election. He spoke before the US changed the plans for the visit.
Still, some residents in Greenland’s capital Nuuk remained angry at the Trump administration ahead of Vance’s visit.
“I am a human. Humans are not for sale. We are not for sale,” Tungutaq Larsen, a filmmaker, told Reuters.
