Greenland asks EU experts to assess its emergency preparedness
Greenland’s government has asked the European Union to help assess how prepared the island is for emergencies, and a team of EU experts is now traveling along its coast, Greenlandic public broadcaster KNR reported on Monday.
The nine-member team from the EU Civil Protection Mechanism includes experts from Finland, Norway, Iceland, Poland and the Netherlands. It visited the capital, Nuuk, last week and will also travel to Uummannaq in northwest Greenland and other coastal communities to meet local officials and inspect emergency equipment. Its findings will feed into a report on how the EU and Greenland could cooperate on civil preparedness.
Greenland, a self-governing territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, left the European Community in 1985 and is not an EU member. Norway and Iceland are also outside the EU but take part in the civil protection mechanism.
Iddimanngiiu Jensen Bianco, Greenland’s minister for emergency preparedness, told KNR that climate change is a major reason the government wants stronger preparedness, citing the risk of tsunamis. In 2017, a landslide-generated tsunami in the Uummannaq region struck the settlement of Nuugaatsiaq, killing four people.
Asked whether the EU cooperation was connected to defense, Bianco said she regarded it as an independent collaboration.
Pekka Tiainen, who represents the EU team, described the mission as routine. “We have been to many other countries that have asked for this kind of expert group, both inside and outside the EU,” he told KNR.
According to KNR, Greenland stands apart from many of those countries because Inuit are more accustomed to getting by on their own in nature. “In Europe, people talk about the population being able to manage on its own for up to 72 hours. In Greenland it’s completely different,” Tiainen said.
He added that it was too early to say what the report would conclude, but that the team had been well received by local authorities.
The EU mission comes as Brussels works to deepen ties with Greenland, which President Donald Trump has insisted should belong to the United States. Earlier this month, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen visited Nuuk and unveiled €200 million ($232 million) in EU investments in Greenland, focused on critical minerals, satellite communications and renewable energy. The Commission has also proposed more than doubling EU funding for Greenland, from €225 million in its current seven-year budget to €530 million for 2028–2034.
Greenland has also expanded its own preparedness efforts since tensions with Washington peaked in January. Its government set up a coordinating preparedness team and issued a leaflet urging households to be ready to cope on their own for five days. In February, Denmark allocated 180 million Danish kroner (about $28 million) for preparedness in Greenland, largely for transport and energy, and in April Greenland created a dedicated ministry for emergency preparedness. The government said in August that most of the Danish funding had already been spent and distributed to communities along the coast.
