PRESIDENT Donald Trump’s calls that Greenland should become part of the United States was met with international condemnation Monday as the autonomous Danish territory’s prime minister putting his foot down on the issue.
Washington’s military intervention in Venezuela has reignited fears for Greenland, which Trump has repeatedly said he wants to annex, given its strategic location in the Arctic.
While aboard Air Force One enroute to Washington, Trump reiterated his proposal.
“We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security, and Denmark is not going to be able to do it,” he said in response to a reporter’s question.
“We’ll worry about Greenland in about two months… let’s talk about Greenland in 20 days.”
The territory’s prime minister issued a clear warning: “That’s enough now.”
“No more pressure. No more insinuations. No more fantasies of annexation,” Jens-Frederik Nielsen said on Facebook.
“We are open to dialogue. We are open to discussions. But this must happen through the proper channels and with respect for international law.”
In the same briefing, Trump said that Cuba was “ready to fall” after US forces seized the leader of its ally Venezuela, while playing down the need for any American military action there.
“Cuba is ready to fall,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One, saying it would be hard for Havana to “hold out” without receiving heavily subsidized Venezuelan oil.
“I don’t think we need any action. It looks like it’s going down.”
Trump made similar threats of military action against Colombia, saying the South American country is “very sick too” and “run by a sick man who likes making cocaine and selling it to the United States.”
“He has cocaine mills and cocaine factories and is not going to be doing it very long,” Trump added.
When asked whether military intervention similar to Venezuela was on the cards for Colombia, Trump curtly replied: “It sounds good to me.”
“You know why, because they kill a lot of people,” Trump claimed without evidence.
Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro on Sunday rejected threats by Trump who also accused him of being a drug trafficker.
Petro rebuffed the accusations, saying his “name does not appear in court records.”
“Stop slandering me, Mr. Trump,” Petro said on the social media platform X.
“That’s not how you threaten a Latin American president who emerged from the armed struggle and then from the people of Colombia’s fight for peace.”
Petro has harshly criticized the Trump administration’s military action in the region and accused Washington of abducting Maduro “without legal basis.”
In a later post to X on Sunday, Petro added, “Friends do not bomb.”
