Greenland decries US doctor’s visit with Trump envoy as ‘deeply problematic’

Greenland’s government has criticised the arrival of a US doctor in Nuuk alongside Donald Trump’s special envoy, Jeff Landry, saying that Greenlanders are not “experimental subjects”.

Joseph Griffin said he had joined the delegation as a volunteer to “assess the medical needs” of the Arctic island, which the US president has repeatedly threatened to invade.

Greenland’s health minister, Anna Wangenheim, immediately condemned his presence, describing it as “deeply problematic”.

“The health sector in Greenland has historically been the subject of geopolitical interest,” she said in a statement hinting at deep sensitivities in the now largely autonomous territory, which as a Danish colony experienced repeated health-related abuses of Indigenous Greenlandic people.

“A society with great distances, a chronic shortage of health professionals and a demographic development that pressures the system makes us vulnerable – and that is precisely why it is deeply problematic when people with a political mission to make Greenland part of the United States send a so-called ‘volunteer doctor’ to Nuuk to ‘assess our needs’.

“Greenlanders are not experimental subjects in a geopolitical project. “Our healthcare system must be developed through respectful cooperation and Greenlandic self-determination, not through political envoys with hidden strategic interests.”

Speaking on Monday after a meeting with Landry, who is also governor of Louisiana, and the US ambassador to Denmark, Kenneth Howery, the Greenlandic prime minister, Jens-Frederik Nielsen, also criticised the doctor’s presence.

He said: “If you want to learn about health conditions in Greenland, you have to contact Greenland through the right channels,” he said.

Griffin’s presence in Greenland appears to be the latest US attempt to intervene in the island’s healthcare system after Trump said in February that a hospital ship was “on its way” – an offer refused by Nuuk. The ship never arrived.

The US delegation’s visit comes as talks between the US and Greenland over the territory’s future continue.

Trump’s repeated assertion that the US must acquire or control the island sparked tension between Washington and Copenhagen, both founding Nato members, and more broadly across Europe.

Nielsen said the meeting with Howery and Landry had been “conducted with mutual respect and in a good tone” but that the Greenlandic government had made it clear their land was not for sale.

“We are committed to continuing the dialogue and finding the best solutions for Greenland. We have reiterated that the Greenlandic people are not for sale, and our right to self-determination is not up for discussion,” he said.