00:00Even here in Denmark, an election in Greenland wouldn't normally get this much attention,
00:07but of course this year is different.
00:09The whole world is watching, and that's because of one man, Donald Trump.
00:14President Trump has had this long-term obsession with acquiring Greenland.
00:19Back in 2019, he offered to buy Greenland from Denmark.
00:24The Danish Prime Minister at the time slapped down that idea, and many people saw it as
00:29a bit of a joke, but no one's laughing now.
00:32The President has since doubled down on that commitment to acquiring Greenland.
00:38He hasn't ruled out the possibility of using force, and recently he said that the US would
00:44get Greenland one way or the other, which many people have seen as a rather ominous
00:49threat both in Greenland and here in Denmark.
00:53Now the reason that he wants it, well there are a few reasons that Donald Trump wants
00:57Greenland.
00:58Fundamentally, because of its geographic and strategic location, it lies smack bang
01:03between the US and Russia.
01:06But it's also got this wealth of critical minerals, these rare earth minerals that are
01:12essential to green energy technologies, and which at the moment, China controls the vast
01:18majority of.
01:19But the possibility of Greenland actually becoming part of the United States is extremely
01:24low.
01:25The vast majority of Greenlanders don't want to be a part of the United States, but this
01:29has thrust the issue of independence from Denmark into the heart of this election.
01:37Now Greenlanders have been able to hold a referendum on independence since 2009, but
01:42they haven't done so primarily because at the moment Denmark provides this block grant
01:47of about a billion Australian dollars, which is about half of the Greenlandic budget, funds
01:53things like education and healthcare, and they're concerned of course that the quality
01:57of life that they have at the moment would decline if they secede from Denmark.
02:03So while many people in Greenland are not wanting to be a part of the United States,
02:08they are hoping that this attention that Donald Trump has brought to the territory could give
02:14them some leverage in the discussions that they're having, the negotiations, about the
02:18kind of support that they might be able to get if they do eventually vote for independence.
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