US President Donald Trump took to Twitter on Monday night, August 19, to share a mischievous tweet that’s likely to further inflame sensitivities over his comments about buying Greenland.
Trump on Sunday confirmed the idea of buying Greenland, the semi-autonomous Danish territory, had been discussed within his administration because of the strategic benefits to the US. For decades, the United States has operated the Thule air force base in Greenland.
But Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen reacted to Trump’s statement by dismissing the idea as “absurd”.
Trump then took to Twitter to photo-shop a picture of his hotel onto a small town in Greenland and tried to make an insensitive joke about it.
He captioned the photo-shopped image: “I promise not to do this to Greenland!”
But his joke fell flat and Twitter users called him out for being insensitive. However, there were those who found his tweet funny and applauded his humour.
One of those is his son, Eric Trump, who wrote on Instagram: “I don’t know about you guys but I love the concept of buying Greenland.”
Donald Trump told reporters on Sunday that the idea of buying Greenland from Denmark was “just something we’ve talked about”.
He said: “Denmark essentially owns it. We’re very good allies with Denmark. We’ve protected Denmark like we protect large portions of the world, so the concept came up.”
However, Danish Prime Minister Ms Frederiksen, visiting Greenland to meet premier Kim Kielsen, reiterated that Greenland was not for sale.
“Greenland is not Danish. Greenland is Greenlandic,” she said. “I persistently hope that this is not something that is seriously meant.”
