PARIS: France’s president will meet the leaders of Denmark and Greenland in Paris on Wednesday for “a working lunch,” his office said Tuesday.
Emmanuel Macron will “reaffirm European solidarity and France’s support for Denmark, Greenland, their sovereignty and their territorial integrity,” the presidency said.
The meeting comes days after US President Donald Trump backed down from threats to seize Greenland, a mineral-rich Arctic island that is an autonomous Danish territory.
The three leaders will discuss “security issues in the Arctic and the economic and social development of Greenland, which France and the European Union are ready to support,” Macron’s office said.
Faced with Russian threats and US ambitions for Greenland, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Greenland leader Jens-Frederik Nielsen have been making rounds with European allies this week including talks in Hamburg and Berlin ahead of visiting Paris Wednesday.
Trump earlier this month had threatened to seize Greenland and impose tariffs on any European countries — including France, Germany and Britain — that opposed him.
Trump later backed down on the threat to take the territory after meeting NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte last week.
Trump and Rutte had agreed on what the US leader called a “framework,” the details of which have not been disclosed.
France has positioned itself at the forefront of European solidarity with Denmark, and is planning to open a consulate in the Greenland capital of Nuuk next month.
France’s president to meet Denmark, Greenland leaders
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France’s president to meet Denmark, Greenland leaders
US lawmaker Fine criticized by rights advocates, Democrats after anti-Muslim remarks
- Fine’s past comments include calling for the mass expulsion of all Muslims from the US, labeling of Muslims as “terrorists” and the mocking of the starvation and killing of Palestinians in Gaza, among others
WASHINGTON: Rights advocates and multiple Democrats on Tuesday condemned anti-Muslim comments by Republican US Representative Randy Fine who said on Sunday that “the choice between dogs and Muslims is not a difficult one.”
Fine, whose comments against Muslims have often sparked outrage, has dismissed the criticism and since doubled down on his remarks on social media. The Council on American-Islamic Relations designated the Republican US lawmaker from Florida as an anti-Muslim extremist last year.
“If they force us to choose, the choice between dogs and Muslims is not a difficult one,” Fine said on X on Sunday in a post that had over 40 million views as of Tuesday afternoon.
Some high-profile Democrats including California Governor Gavin Newsom called for him to resign while House of Representatives Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries called Fine an “Islamophobic, disgusting and unrepentant bigot.”
Jeffries also called for Republicans — who hold a majority in both chambers of Congress — to hold Fine accountable.
“To ignore this is to accept and normalize it,” Democratic US Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said. Fine’s past comments include calling for the mass expulsion of all Muslims from the US, labeling of Muslims as “terrorists” and the mocking of the starvation and killing of Palestinians in Gaza, among others. Rights advocates have noted a rise in Islamophobia in the US in recent years due to a range of factors including hard-line immigration policies and white-supremacist rhetoric, as well as the fallout of Israel’s war in Gaza on American society.
