NUUK: French President Emmanuel Macron’s first trip to Greenland, the strategic Arctic island coveted by US President Donald Trump, is aimed at shoring up Europe’s political backing for Denmark and its semiautonomous territory.
Macron’s visit on Sunday comes just ahead a meeting of the Group of Seven leading industrialized nations next week in Canada that will be attended by both Macron and Trump.
The French president’s office said the trip to Greenland is a reminder that Paris supports principles of sovereignty, territorial integrity and the inviolability of borders as enshrined in the UN charter.
Macron is also to meet with Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Greenlandic Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen.
Macron mentioned Greenland last week in his opening speech at the UN Ocean Conference, saying it isn’t “up for grabs” in remarks that appeared directed largely at Trump.
“The deep seas are not for sale, nor is Greenland up for grabs, nor are the Arctic or the high seas for sale, nor are fishing licenses in developing countries up for grabs, nor are scientific data and the security of coastal populations to be sacrificed,″ Macron said at the summit in Nice, France.
Macron’s role in Europe
Macron in recent months has sought to reinvigorate France’s role as the diplomatic and economic heavyweight of the 27-nation European Union.
The French president has positioned himself as a leader in Europe amid Trump’s threats to pull support from Ukraine as it fights against Russia’s invasion. Macron hosted a summit in Paris with other European heads of state to discuss Kyiv, as well as security issues on the continent.
Sunday’s visit will also be the occasion to discuss how to further enhance relations between the EU and Greenland when it comes to economic development, low-carbon energy transition and critical minerals. The leaders will also have exchanges on efforts to curb global warming, according to Macron’s office.
A meeting between Macron, Frederiksen and Nielsen will take place on a Danish helicopter carrier, showing France’s concerns over security issues in the region, Macron’s office said.
Trump and Greenland
Last week, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth appeared to acknowledge that the Pentagon has developed plans to take over Greenland and Panama by force if necessary but refused to answer repeated questions during a hotly combative congressional hearing Thursday about his use of Signal chats to discuss military operations.
Hegseth’s comments were the latest controversial remarks made by a member of the Trump administration about the Arctic island. The president himself has said he won’t rule out military force to take over Greenland, which he considers vital to American security in the high north.
The Wall Street Journal last month reported that several high-ranking officials under the US director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, had directed intelligence agency heads to learn more about Greenland’s independence movement and sentiment about US resource extraction there.
Nielsen in April said that US statements about the island have been disrespectful and that Greenland “will never, ever be a piece of property that can be bought by just anyone.”
Macron to visit Greenland to show European support for the strategic Arctic island coveted by Trump
https://arab.news/vxtr5
Macron to visit Greenland to show European support for the strategic Arctic island coveted by Trump
- The French president mentioned Greenland last week in his opening speech at the UN Ocean Conference, saying it isn’t “up for grabs” in remarks that appeared directed largely at Trump
Nigeria signals more strikes likely in ‘joint’ US operations
- Nigeria on Friday signalled more strikes against jihadist groups were expected after a Christmas Day bombardment by US forces against militants in the north of the country
LAGOS: Nigeria on Friday signalled more strikes against jihadist groups were expected after a Christmas Day bombardment by US forces against militants in the north of the country.
The west African country faces multiple interlinked security crises in its north, where jihadists have been waging an insurgency in the northeast since 2009 and armed “bandit” gangs raid villages and stage kidnappings in the northwest.
The US strikes come after Abuja and Washington were locked in a diplomatic dispute over what Trump characterised as the mass killing of Christians amid Nigeria’s myriad armed conflicts.
Washington’s framing of the violence as amounting to Christian “persecution” is rejected by the Nigerian government and independent analysts, but has nonetheless resulted in increased security coordination.
“It’s Nigeria that provided the intelligence,” the country’s foreign minister, Yusuf Tuggar, told broadcaster Channels TV, saying he was on the phone with US State Secretary Marco Rubio ahead of the bombardment.
Asked if there would be more strikes, Tuggar said: “It is an ongoing thing, and we are working with the US. We are working with other countries as well.”
Targets unclear
The Department of Defense’s US Africa Command, using an acronym for the Daesh group, said “multiple Daesh terrorists” were killed in an attack in the northwestern state of Sokoto.
US defense officials later posted video of what appeared to be the nighttime launch of a missile from the deck of a battleship flying the US flag.
Which of Nigeria’s myriad armed groups were targeted remains unclear.
Nigeria’s jihadist groups are mostly concentrated in the northeast of the country, but have made inroads into the northwest.
Researchers have recently linked some members from an armed group known as Lakurawa — the main jihadist group located in Sokoto State — to Islamic State Sahel Province (ISSP), which is mostly active in neighboring Niger and Mali.
Other analysts have disputed those links, though research on Lakurawa is complicated as the term has been used to describe various armed fighters in the northwest.
Those described as Lakurawa also reportedly have links to Al-Qaeda affiliated group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM), a rival group to ISSP.
While Abuja has welcomed the strikes, “I think Trump would not have accepted a ‘No’ from Nigeria,” said Malik Samuel, an Abuja-based researcher for Good Governance Africa, an NGO.
Amid the diplomatic pressure, Nigerian authorities are keen to be seen as cooperating with the US, Samuel told AFP, even though “both the perpetrators and the victims in the northwest are overwhelmingly Muslim.”
Tuggar said that Nigerian President Bola Tinubu “gave the go-ahead” for the strikes.
The foreign minister added: “It must be made clear that it is a joint operation, and it is not targeting any religion nor simply in the name of one religion or the other.”
