Donald Trump\u2019s tug-of-war over Greenland recalled \u201ccenturies of imperialism by different nation states but also colonisation by different actors\u201d, said Natan Obed, the president of Canada\u2019s national Inuit organisation, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami.<\/p>\n
\u201cInuit have had to figure out how to maintain our society, our culture and our self-determination in the midst of other people wanting different things from us or from our lands and territories.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was a past many thought they had left behind. \u201cThe overtures from the United States \u2013 and it isn\u2019t just one individual but a chorus of individuals all saying very similar things \u2013 makes us incredibly worried that we are on the precipice of another age of disrespect for our collective rights,\u201d said Obed.<\/p>\n
Natan Obed: \u2018The decisions that are made about our land and what we want for it are ours alone.\u2019 Photograph: Getty Images<\/p>\n
Particularly concerning was the focus on Greenland\u2019s efforts to extract mineral wealth or create defence positions<\/a>, said Obed. \u201cThat\u2019s the scariest part of the rhetoric that has been circulating,\u201d he said. \u201cI did believe we were beyond this central premise that if Indigenous peoples do not improve our land based on the criteria of imperialist actors, that somehow we do not have self-determination. The decisions that are made about our land and what we want for it are ours alone.\u201d<\/p>\n While Trump recently pledged that he would not take Greenland by force, the White House has signalled<\/a> that it remains keen to control the world\u2019s largest<\/a> island. Jeff Landry, the US special envoy to Greenland, penned an op-ed describing Greenland as \u201cone of the world\u2019s most strategically consequential regions\u201d.<\/p>\n Iqaluit residents Laakkuluk Williamson Bathory and Siku Rojas hold a Greenlandic banner during a solidarity march through Nunavut. Photograph: Canadian Press\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n The 976-word piece, published in the New York Times, made no mention of the Indigenous people who had stewarded the land for millennia, noting instead: \u201cThe president has been unequivocal: American dominance in the Arctic<\/a> is non-negotiable.\u201d<\/p>\n In Greenland, residents have described Trump\u2019s statements about \u201cbuying\u201d or \u201ctaking over\u201d the territory as a return to a time<\/a> when Indigenous lands were seen solely as commodities to be acquired, leaving Inuit sidelined from the political negotiations that shaped their lives.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the increased tension between great powers, our concern is that the Arctic is portrayed as an asset or as an empty ice desert,\u201d said Sara Olsvig, chair of the Inuit Circumpolar Council and a former leader of Inuit Ataqatigiit, a leftwing<\/a> pro-independence<\/a> political party in Greenland. \u201cTo us it is our homeland, its riches are what sustain our people, our culture, our children, youth, and elders. Inuit have lived and thrived in our Arctic region for time immemorial, long before the concept of states.\u201d<\/p>\n Sara Olsvig: \u2018To us it is our homeland, its riches are what sustain our people, our culture, our children, youth, and elders.\u2019 Photograph: Evgeniy Maloletka\/AP<\/p>\n The push for power had laid bare how many had failed to recognise that after centuries of rule under Denmark, Greenland was now<\/a> a self-governing territory within the Kingdom of Denmark. \u201cThus, Greenland is not \u2018owned\u2019 by Denmark, nor can Denmark \u2019sell\u2019 Greenland,\u201d Olsvig said in a statement.<\/p>\n The past months had been laced with \u201cconnotations to earlier times of colonisation\u201d, she said, forcing her and others to stress that Inuit and the people of Greenland were equal to all others.<\/p>\n \u201cNot repeating the wrongdoings of past imperialism is important,\u201d she said, adding: \u201cThere is no such thing as a better coloniser.\u201d<\/p>\n As Trump\u2019s rhetoric intensified, Inuit in Alaska had followed the situation closely. Marie Greene, the president of the Inuit Circumpolar Council \u2013 Alaska, said: \u201cAt first it was unbelievable, then it became heartbreaking as we heard about our people, especially kids and elders, worrying about being invaded.\u201d<\/p>\n The threats were a sharp blow to Inuit who had long worked together to ensure that the Arctic remained a zone of peace, even as tensions simmered<\/a> among the world powers that surround it. \u201cFor Inuit, peace in the Arctic is not an abstract principle; it is about protecting our homelands, our families, and the future of our children,\u201d said Vivian Korthuis, also of the Inuit Circumpolar Council \u2013 Alaska. \u201cLasting peace comes from listening to Inuit, respecting our rights, and engaging with us as partners whose knowledge and responsibility are rooted in the Arctic itself.\u201d<\/p>\n Map showing Arctic ice extent , with Canada, US (Alaska) and Russia marked<\/a><\/p>\n The conversation over Greenland had reinforced how Indigenous peoples are uniquely vulnerable to geopolitical turbulence, said Gunn-Britt Retter of the Saami Council, an organisation representing the S\u00e1mi peoples of Finland, Russia, Norway and Sweden.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen geopolitics gets heated, you get into this mode where state leaders start talking and the first thing that is forgotten is Indigenous peoples,\u201d said Retter. \u201cThere\u2019s always something more important. It\u2019s like: \u2018Yeah we value Indigenous peoples or we respect the rights of Indigenous peoples, but right now this is more important.\u201d<\/p>\n The sense was that Indigenous rights were something to be held up in good times, only to be overridden when strategic interests, such as the threat of tariffs, come up, said Retter. \u201cIndigenous issues become something to talk about when there are budget surpluses.\u201d<\/p>\n For many in the Arctic, it was hard not to see the threats looming over Greenland as a sign of what was to come, said Obed of Canada\u2019s Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami. \u201cWe understand that we are increasingly in the centre of a geopolitical fight that is not necessarily around our culture or our society, but is in our homeland, in our back yards,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n He pointed to the vast funds that both Russia and China<\/a> had poured into<\/a> bolstering ports in and around the Russian Arctic and the quiet scramble<\/a> to claim<\/a> the Northwest Passage as climate change transforms the region as examples.<\/p>\n \u201cWe know these fights are coming,\u201d said Obed. \u201cSo this is the moment to build alliances and strategies and plans to ensure that when those times come, we\u2019re ready for that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On a bitterly cold recent morning in the Canadian Arctic, about 70 people took to the streets. Braving…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":449444,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[49,48,295,66],"class_list":{"0":"post-449443","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-environment","11":"tag-science"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/449443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=449443"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/449443\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/449444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=449443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=449443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=449443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"What](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/6623.jpg\")
What do people in Greenland think of Trump\u2019s threats? \u2013 video<\/p>\n