Danish king to visit Greenland in show of unity amid Trump interest

By Louise Rasmussen

COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - Denmark's King Frederik will visit Greenland next week, the royal palace said on Wednesday, in a show of solidarity with the semi-autonomous Danish territory that U.S. President Donald Trump says he wants to control.

In a further display of unity, Greenland's prime minister, Jens-Frederik Nielsen, will travel to Denmark for talks on April 26, the Greenlandic and Danish governments said.

Greenland is rich in raw materials, including minerals critical to advance new technologies, and Trump has said the United States needs control of the strategically-located island for reasons of national and international security.

The leaders of Denmark and Greenland have said that only Greenlanders can decide the territory's future.

"We live in a time that calls for unity. We must support each other in the difficult foreign policy situation that Greenland and the Danish Realm currently are in," Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said in a statement.

She and Nielsen will discuss the geopolitical situation and ties between Denmark and Greenland, Nielsen told Greenlandic daily newspaper Sermitsiaq.

King Frederik, who is Denmark's head of state but does not hold formal political powers, will go to Greenland with Nielsen when the prime minister returns to the Arctic island on April 28. The king last visited Greenland with his wife Queen Mary from June 29-July 6 last year.

During a visit to Greenland last month, U.S. Vice President JD Vance accused Denmark of not doing a good job of keeping the island safe from Russia and China, and suggested the U.S. could better protect the territory.

Frederiksen also visited Greenland this month and said the United States "shall not take over Greenland". She called for increased Arctic defence collaboration with the United States and dismissed the U.S. desire to annex the island.

Relations between Copenhagen and Nuuk, Greenland's capital, have often been difficult but King Frederik and the wider royal family are popular among the people of Greenland.

The king will visit Nuuk as well as going to Station Nord, a military outpost in the far north, and the Sirius Patrol, a special forces command that uses dog sleds to travel across the Greenland's vast glacier.

(Reporting by Louise Breusch Rasmussen, editing by Essi Lehto, Terje Solsvik and Timothy Heritage)