US Vice President JD Vance announced on Tuesday he would join his wife, Usha, on an unsolicited trip to Greenland, but scaled back the visit amid criticism of the original trip.
A delegation from Washington including JD and Usha Vance, National Security Adviser Mike Waltz and Energy Secretary Chris Wright were set to visit semi-autonomous Danish territory from Thursday until Sunday.
Usha Vance's office originally said she and one of her three children had planned to visit Greenland's historical sites and take part in a dog-sled race, but her husband suggested the trip would now be centred on a visit to the US Pituffik Space base on the northwest coast of the island.
Waltz's name has since been omitted from the list of visitors after JD Vance announced he was attending.
Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen told Danish media it was "positive that the Americans cancelled their visit to the Greenlandic society.”
“Instead, they will visit their own base, Pituffik, and we have nothing against that,” he said.
The acting government of Greenland noted "that the previously announced US delegation visit to Nuuk and Sisimiut has been cancelled by the US government.”
JD Vance framed the visit to the space base as necessary to check on the island's security.
The vice-president said, "a lot of other countries have threatened Greenland, have threatened to use its territories and its waterways to threaten the United States, to threaten Canada, and of course, to threaten the people of Greenland."
“Speaking for President (Donald) Trump, we want to reinvigorate the security of the people of Greenland because we think it’s important to protecting the security of the entire world,” Vance concluded in an online video.
The previously planned trip involving Usha Vance, Waltz and Wright, had been slammed by both Greenlandic and Danish politicians.
On Tuesday, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said the US was putting "unacceptable pressure" on the island, a semi-autonomous Danish territory.
"You cannot make a private visit with official representatives from another country," Frederiksen told Danish media.
“It is clearly not a visit that is about what Greenland needs, or what Greenland wants," Frederikson concluded.
Greenland's Prime Minister Múte B Egede, who will remain in his post until a new government is formed following fresh elections, called the visit "highly aggressive" earlier on Monday.
Discontent around the visit grew sharper on Monday evening, with the Greenland government posting on Facebook that it had “not extended any invitations for any visits, neither private nor official.”
Both Egede and Frederikson have rejected Trump's repeated advances that the US could take control of the island. Copenhagen, which controls Greenland's foreign and defence policy, has recognised the island's right to independence at a time of its choosing.
Trump on Monday reiterated his desire to take over Greenland, using national security as a justification. He argued that the visit was about "friendliness, not provocation".
