Denmark vs the US: What Greenland really wants

The US president's talk about taking control has come at a time when many on the island are already considering their future

British Broadcasting CorporationWatch LiveHomeNewsSportBusinessInnovationCultureArtsTravelEarthVideoLiveHomeNewsIsrael-Gaza WarWar in UkraineUS & CanadaUKUK PoliticsEnglandN. IrelandN. Ireland PoliticsScotlandScotland PoliticsWalesWales PoliticsAfricaAsiaChinaIndiaAustraliaEuropeLatin AmericaMiddle EastIn PicturesBBC InDepthBBC VerifySportBusinessExecutive LoungeTechnology of BusinessFuture of BusinessInnovationTechnologyScience & HealthArtificial IntelligenceAI v the MindCultureFilm & TVMusicArt & DesignStyleBooksEntertainment NewsArtsArts in MotionTravelDestinationsAfricaAntarcticaAsiaAustralia and PacificCaribbean & BermudaCentral AmericaEuropeMiddle EastNorth AmericaSouth AmericaWorld’s TableCulture & ExperiencesAdventuresThe SpeciaListEarthNatural WondersWeather & ScienceClimate SolutionsSustainable BusinessGreen LivingVideoLiveLive NewsLive SportHomeNewsSportBusinessInnovationCultureArtsTravelEarthVideoLiveAudioWeatherNewslettersGreenland's dark history - and does it want Trump?15 hours agoPeter HarmsenJournalist and author of Fury and Ice: Greenland, the United States and Germany in World War IIReporting fromCopenhagenBBCOn a hill above Nuuk's cathedral stands a 7ft statue of the protestant missionary Hans Egede. He had reopened Greenland's link with Northern Europe in the early 1700s and laid the groundwork for the establishment of Denmark's proudest colonial possession.

One day in the late 1970s, the bronze figure was suddenly covered in red paint.

I remember that day well - I passed the statue every day on my mile long walk to school. I spent two years living on Greenland while my father taught geography at Nuuk's teacher training college.

It was apparent not everyone among the Inuit majority was happy about the changes that Egede had brought to Greenland a quarter of a millennium earlier.

The clinking of beer bottles in filled plastic bags carried home by the Inuit to their tiny apartments – much smaller, usually, than the ones we Danes lived in – was testimony to pervasive alcoholism, one of the ills that Denmark had brought to Greenland, amid a lot that was undeniably good: modern health, good education.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gpgqqzqymo

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