Technical talks between the US, Denmark and Greenland on drafting an Arctic security agreement are underway, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday.
The foreign ministers of Denmark and Greenland agreed to create a working group aimed at addressing differences with the US during a meeting in Washington earlier this month with Vice President JD Vance and Rubio.
The group was created after President Donald Trump’s repeated calls for the US to take over Greenland, a Danish territory, in the name of countering threats from Russia and China – calls that Greenland, Denmark and European allies strongly rejected.
“This starts today and it will be an orderly process,” Rubio told the task force while testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “We’re going to try to do this in a way that’s not like a media circus every time these conversations happen, because we think that creates more flexibility on both sides to come to a positive outcome.”
The Danish Foreign Ministry said Wednesday’s talks focused on “how we can address US concerns about security in the Arctic, while respecting the Kingdom’s red lines.” The red lines refer to Greenland’s sovereignty.
Trump’s renewed threats in recent weeks to annex Greenland, which is a semi-autonomous territory of a NATO ally, have strained US-European relations.
Trump this month announced he would impose new tariffs on Denmark and seven other European countries that resisted his calls to take over Greenland, only to quickly withdraw his threats after a “framework” for a deal on access to the mineral-rich island was reached with the help of NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte. Few details of the deal have come to light.
After fierce opposition from European allies to his rhetoric on Greenland, Trump also announced at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last week that he would take the possibility of using US military force to purchase Greenland off the table.
The president backed off his tariff threats and softened his language after Wall Street suffered its biggest losses in months on concerns that Trump’s Greenland ambitions could spark a trade war and fundamentally tear apart NATO, a 32-member transatlantic military alliance that has been a pillar of security since World War II.
Rubio on Wednesday seemed eager to downplay Trump’s rift with Europe over Greenland.
“We have a little bit of work to do, but I think we’re going to get to a good point and I think you’ll hear the same from our colleagues in Europe very soon,” Rubio said.
During Wednesday’s hearing, Rubio also had a heated exchange with Senator Tim Kaine, Democrat of Virginia, over Trump’s repeated reference to Greenland as Iceland during his time in Davos.
“Yes, he meant Greenland, but I think we’re all familiar with presidents who have verbal blunders,” Rubio said in response to Kaine’s questions about Trump’s blunder — secretly taking aim at former President Joe Biden. “We’ve had presidents like that before. Some have won a lot more than this one.”
