US President Donald Trump is due to meet the leaders of Denmark and Greenland on Tuesday to sign an agreement allowing a larger US military presence on the strategically located Arctic island.
The deal is expected to expand the US military footprint beyond the existing Pituffik Space Base, with two additional sites at Narsarsuaq, a former Cold War airbase, and Mestersvig, currently used by Denmark’s Sirius Dog Sled Patrol.
Trump will meet Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Greenland Prime Minister Jens Frederik Nielsen at the UN General Assembly in New York for the signing ceremony.
Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said the agreement would place Arctic security under NATO’s collective responsibility. Frederiksen said the deal respects Denmark’s sovereignty and Greenland’s right to self determination.
The agreement follows months of tensions after Trump said in January that he would not rule out military or economic force to acquire Greenland, triggering a diplomatic crisis between the United States, Denmark and Greenland.
Trump later said the deal would give Washington permanent control over security and other needs in Greenland. Denmark has not endorsed that description.
The agreement’s full text has not been released, leaving uncertainty over whether it will amend a 1951 US Denmark defence treaty or establish a separate framework.
The expansion would represent the biggest increase in US military infrastructure on Greenland since the Cold War, when Washington operated 17 installations and had more than 10,000 personnel on the island.
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