Donald Trump has linked his repeated threats to seize control of Greenland to his failure to win the Nobel peace prize, as transatlantic tensions over the Arctic island escalated further and threatened to rekindle a trade war with the EU.
In an extraordinary text message sent on Sunday to the Norwegian prime minister, Jonas Gahr Støre, the US president wrote that after being snubbed for the prize, he no longer felt the need to think “purely of peace”. “Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace,” he wrote, adding that the US needed “complete and total control” of Greenland.
Trump has ramped up his push to grab the island, a largely self-governing part of Denmark, in recent weeks, saying that the US would take control “one way or the other”. On Saturday he threatened to impose from 1 February a punitive 10% tariff, increasing later to 25%, on imports from Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands and Finland unless they dropped their objections to his plan.
The dispute has plunged trade relations between the EU and the US into fresh chaos, forcing the bloc to consider retaliatory measures, and also risks unravelling the Nato transatlantic alliance. Trump has rocked the EU and Nato by refusing to rule out military force to seize the strategically important, mineral-rich island, which is covered by many of the protections offered by the two organisations since Denmark is a member of both.
In a brief telephone interview with NBC on Monday, Trump declined to comment on whether he would rule out seizing Greenland by force, insisted he would “100%” push ahead with his tariff plans, and blamed Norway for denying him the Nobel prize. “Norway totally controls it despite what they say,” he added.
EU leaders will meet for an emergency summit in Brussels on Thursday to discuss their response, which could include a package of tariffs on €93bn (£80bn) of US imports that has been suspended for six months since the two sides reached a trade deal last year.
