Two days after he said that buying Greenland was not a top priority, US President Donald Trump canceled an upcoming trip to Denmark, which owns the mostly frozen island, after Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen dismissed the idea.
Frederiksen had called Trump’s musing about buying the Danish territory “an absurd discussion” after the former real-estate-mogul-turned-president began to talk up the idea.
Trump on Sunday said that he was interested in such a deal for strategic purposes, but added that it was not a priority.
Trump even joked about his proposal as it came in for ridicule, tweeting a doctored photograph of a glistening Trump skyscraper looming over a small village in the Arctic territory.
“I promise not to do this to Greenland,” he said on Monday.
However, Trump on Tuesday abruptly canceled the visit, also by tweet.
“Denmark is a very special country with incredible people, but based on Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen’s comments, that she would have no interest in discussing the purchase of Greenland, I will be postponing our meeting scheduled in two weeks for another time,” Trump said on Twitter.
“The Prime Minister was able to save a great deal of expense and effort for both the United States and Denmark by being so direct. I thank her for that and look forward to rescheduling sometime in the future,” he added.
White House spokesman Judd Deere later said that the visit to Denmark has been canceled.
Just a few hours earlier, the US embassy in Denmark had said on Twitter that it was “ready for the POTUS @realDonaldTrump visit!” using an acronym for “President of the United States.”
The White House late last month announced that Trump had accepted an invitation to visit Denmark’s Queen Margrethe and participate in a series of meetings, including with Frederiksen and business leaders.
The trip, set to begin at the end of this month, was to include a stop in Poland to observe the 80th anniversary of the start of World War II.
Trump is expected to go ahead with the Warsaw visit.
Asked about Greenland on Sunday as he prepared to return to Washington after a vacation week at his home in New Jersey, Trump said that “strategically ... it would be nice” to own the island.
He also suggested that he might not visit Denmark at all, saying that he did not think the previously announced trip had been “absolutely set in stone yet.”
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