Lars Løkke Rasmussen hopes next week brings a binding Greenland agreement respecting the Kingdom's red lines
Danish Minister for Foreign Affairs and political leader of Moderaterne, in a post on his own Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn profiles (his X and Instagram bios say the profiles are not kept in his ministerial capacity)
“Next week could be a good week… For Greenland, Denmark and the USA alike. Where a long period of uncertainty is hopefully replaced by a binding agreement that strengthens security in the Arctic and the North Atlantic and thus also our shared security in NATO and Europe - with respect for the Kingdom's red lines.”
Source and context
Original post
About this source
Opened directly; page metadata and JSON-LD give author Lars Løkke Rasmussen, datePublished 2026-09-19T08:14:20.919Z and the post text, and the Danish original below was checked as one contiguous span of that text. The same text is on his Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn profiles; TV 2 saw the Instagram version by 07:43 UTC, so this LinkedIn copy is a later cross-post. The quotation is DI's English translation. Original Danish: 'Næste uge kan blive en god uge… For både Grønland, Danmark og USA. Hvor lang tids usikkerhed forhåbentlig erstattes af en bindende aftale, der styrker sikkerheden i Arktis og Nordatlanten og dermed også vores fælles sikkerhed i NATO og Europa - med respekt for Kongerigets røde linjer.' The posted text reads 'Hvor lang tids usikkerhed' (apparently 'Hvor' as a relative adverb continuing 'a good week'); it is translated as 'Where a long period of uncertainty ...'. The post ends with one more sentence, not quoted.
Original post
About this source
The page returns HTTP 400 to a plain HTTP client; its text was read through the fetch tool and matches the LinkedIn text word for word (NATO capitalised). The fetch tool showed only a relative time ('5 hours ago' at about 13:10 UTC), no exact timestamp. Ritzau's report (published by Sermitsiaq and others) names Facebook as the platform.
Reporting
About this source
TV 2 says the words are from an Instagram post carrying a photograph from his early-2026 visit to Washington. Its printed quotation stops after 'NATO og Europa' and omits the red-lines clause, so it is not the source of the quoted span; it corroborates the wording and the time (07:43 UTC, before the LinkedIn copy). The live blog dates from 2025-01-06, so each entry has its own timestamp.
Reporting
About this source
AP text as syndicated by WRAL (published 09:38 UTC, updated 13:28 UTC). AP gives its own English rendering of the same post and says he wrote it on Instagram on Saturday morning; its rendering drops the word 'long' and, in this copy, the red-lines clause, so the DI translation follows the Danish original. It also states the deal has not yet been made public.
Original text
About this source
Read in full on the trumpstruth.org archive mirror, which shows the full text, the original post date (Friday, September 18, 2026, 05:18 pm EDT), the Truth Social status ID and the original URL https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/117294126158197822; truthsocial.com itself is Cloudflare-blocked and was not opened. The post says the United States “has entered into an Agreement,” whereas the Danish and Greenlandic release describes an expected agreement still to be signed. The identical text was posted on Trump’s X account (separate source). This page was captured by the mirror on September 19, 2026 at 11:51 AM EDT; the mirror’s later Truth Social entries through 12:52 PM EDT that day, including the transcript of a 1:06 AM video, do not mention Greenland.
Official statement
About this source
Context source for contextBefore, not a source of the quotation. Official English version of the joint release; opened and read, and the Danish original on stm.dk was opened as well.
Before the quotation
On the evening of 18 September 2026 (U.S. Eastern time), President Trump announced on Truth Social an agreement with Denmark and Greenland that he said gives the United States permanent control over security and all other needs in Greenland. A joint release from the Danish Prime Minister's Office and the Government of Greenland said the three governments were expected to sign an agreement the following week at the UN General Assembly, after which it would need to pass the necessary national parliamentary procedures.
After the quotation
TV 2 reported the post at 09.43 Copenhagen time as his first reaction to the news, and AP reported it later that day, noting that the agreement had not yet been made public.
How this statement is classified
Case context: Trump’s “permanent control” description of the announced U.S.-Denmark-Greenland security agreement
The label describes this statement’s response within the context above.
Why this label?
The case's fixed reference point is President Trump's description, in his Truth Social post of 2026-09-18, of the not-yet-signed, unpublished U.S.-Denmark-Greenland agreement as giving the United States permanent control over security and all other needs in Greenland. Løkke Rasmussen welcomes the prospect of a binding agreement that strengthens Arctic and North Atlantic security, but he words it as a hope ('hopefully') and makes it 'with respect for the Kingdom's red lines', and he does not mention Trump's description. The closest competing label is defends_or_excuses, because he welcomes the prospective agreement. That loses because his welcome is hedged and tied to the red-lines condition, and he does not affirm Trump's description of permanent U.S. control.
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Trump’s “permanent control” description of the announced U.S.-Denmark-Greenland security agreement
Explore the case context, sources and public responses.
More from this case
Read the full case“I'm looking forward to the ink being dry on the new agreement with the USA. And to us being able to see the content. Until then, I'm skeptical. I don't have much confidence in Trump.”Read statement
“We will have to wait with that until the agreement is published next week. So I don't have many comments on that.”Read statement
“An important and positive piece of news for Greenland, Denmark and our shared security. Greenland, Denmark and the USA are on their way toward an agreement that is to strengthen security in the Arctic and the North Atlantic. For me it is absolutely crucial that the agreement recognises the Kingdom's sovereignty and Greenlanders' right to decide their own future. These are fundamental principles that we must stand firm on.”Read statement