Save Greenland for us all with a global protectorate | Letters

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Your leader marks the historic moment when European nations finally stepped up to Trump’s bullying over Greenland (The Guardian view on Trump and Greenland: get real! Bullying is not strength, 18 January). However, Keir Starmer’s response remains weak. By saying Greenland is only a matter for Denmark and Greenland, he tries to rewind the clock to a status quo that is plainly no longer adequate.

Greater vision has a clear historical precedent: for nearly 70 years, Antarctica has been kept out of military competition and resource grabs by the Antarctic treaty. With this 1959 treaty, countries with competing interests accepted that some places are too important to be owned, and must instead be protected for science, peace and the common good.

That precedent applies even more strongly to Greenland. Its ice sheet plays a central role in regulating the global climate, and what happens there affects everyone. Creating a new strong international protectorate, explicitly safeguarding Greenlanders’ right to have a veto over its terms, could address defence and climate risks for the international community too. If the UK and the EU truly believe in strong diplomacy, this is the moment to show imagination, and to walk as well as talk, on the road back to international cooperation. Future stability could be built around a process of creating a Greenlandic international protectorate.
Dr Rupert Read
Co-director, Climate Majority Project
Dr Andrew Boswell
Climate policy consultant
Dr Nick Brooks
Director, Garama 3C
Bridget McKenzie
Founder, Climate Museum UK

• I found the piece about Donald Trump’s billionaire “friend” Ronald Lauder sickening (How a billionaire with interests in Greenland encouraged Trump to acquire the territory, 15 January). Lauder’s huge business empire deals in beauty, but his motives are beyond ugly. His cosy relationship with the president and his deals in Greenland are yet more evidence of the greedy gang of men getting rich with Trump – from his sons Donald Jr and Eric to his real‑estate pal Steve Witkoff and his son-in-law Jared Kushner.

I have always loved one perfume made by Estée Lauder, called Pleasures. But I’ve now thrown it away. That sweet fragrance is poison for all of us who despise the exploitation of resources and peoples that this man and his evil gang stand for: they stink.
Dee Cook
Whitchurch, Shropshire

• Greenland was part of the European Union until 1985, when it left following a referendum. As a then member of the European parliament’s Socialist group, I sat alongside Finn Lynge, representing the country for the Siumut party.

Maybe in light of the fact that Donald Trump is intent on “conquering Greenland” and the country’s dramatically changed circumstances, and its preference for Denmark and the EU over the US, Ursula von der Leyen could offer fast-track re-entry. You never know, it might set a precedent.
Glyn Ford
Labour MEP 1984-2009

• Surely it would send the US government a message if all European countries – not just those threatened by additional tariffs for supporting Greenland – stated that they would pull out of both the Fifa World Cup this year and the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics if Trump persists in his plans to take over Greenland.
Caroline Duchet
Chepstow, Monmouthshire

• It’s a bit rich of Trump to ask of the Danes about Greenland: “Why do they have a ‘right of ownership’ anyway? There are no written documents, it’s only that a boat landed there hundreds of years ago” (Donald Trump links Greenland threats to Nobel snub as EU trade war looms, 19 January). Surely that’s the same premise that led to the existence of the United States of America?
Rupert Featherstone
Dickleburgh, Norfolk

• Wait, so are you telling me that appeasement doesn’t work (EU considers retaliatory measures over Trump Greenland tariff ‘blackmail’, 19 January)? If only there was some historical precedent from which we could have learnt this lesson…
Séamus McGrenera
London