GRU, Alm.del - 2022-23 (2. samling) - Bilag 16: DIIS POLICY BRIEF SEPTEMBER 2022: NUUK AS A DIPLOMATIC SCENE: PROTOCOL, PITFALLS, AND PRACTICE

Grønlandsudvalget 2022-23 (2. samling)
GRU Alm.del Bilag 16
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DIIS POLICY BRIEF SEPTEMBER 2022

NUUK AS A DIPLOMATIC SCENE:

PROTOCOL, PITFALLS, AND PRACTICE

As Greenland’s importance for international security

grows, so does the grey zone of overlapping civilian

issues managed by Greenland and security political

issues managed by Denmark. This makes Nuuk a

difficult diplomatic scene to navigate.

Even though Greenlanders and Danes have shared a

constitutional grey zone for decades, the zone has

now expanded as Danes maintain that foreign and

security policy ultimately belong in Copenhagen, while

Greenlanders find that this would mean hollowing out

their autonomy, since the strategic position of their

RECOMMENDATIONS

To succeed in Nuuk, a diplomat needs to

■

accept the faux pas that comes with operating

in a constitutional grey zone

■

manage the optics

■

bring manpower and brace for competition

■

understand Nuuk’s place in diplomatic networks.

GRU, Alm.del - 2022-23 (2. samling) - Bilag 16: DIIS POLICY BRIEF SEPTEMBER 2022: NUUK AS A DIPLOMATIC SCENE: PROTOCOL, PITFALLS, AND PRACTICE

island gives many domestic issues a security

aspects. If outsiders want to overstep constitutional

and postcolonial lines only on purpose, they need to

understand both the formalities and the struggles over

them. Sometimes the optics are more controversial

than that which goes on backstage. At other times,

one or more players keep up appearances while

grinding their teeth.

Cat-and-mouse in the grey zone

Developed over time, the division of competences and

decision-making procedures between Denmark and

Greenland are complex. The Government of Greenland

continues to push the limits by insisting that they

decide whom to talk to about what. Since acting the

part of a colonial oppressor might push Greenland

towards declaring independence, the Danish

government is reluctant to put its foot down. So,

“for the sake of transparency, we invite them even

where they really have no business”, according to

a Danish official.

At times, diplomacy in Nuuk turns into a game of

cat and mouse in the constitutional grey zone.

Greenlanders occasionally suspect that Danes push

important business about their island into back

channels. Conversely, Greenlanders do not feel

the need to invite Danes to meetings with foreign

diplomats on what they consider as domestic issues,

since, as one puts it, ”It’s only natural to keep it

bilateral, if it’s our jurisdiction”. One Danish official

counters that they need to be in such meetings as

a rearguard measure, since ”they are not supposed

to talk defense.”

Accept faux pas

Nevertheless, Danish authorities at times find it

convenient that Greenland sends up their own trial

balloons, rather than reigning them in before they get

shot down, in order to teach Greenland about the

world’s reactions and vice versa. At other times, such

maneuvers are staged in coordination between Nuuk

and Copenhagen to enhance negotiating power, or

conflict is ritualized in ways hard to accept for

outsiders. As a foreign diplomat recalls, ”First time I

was in a meeting where a Greenlandic minister said;

’We want independence’, I was shocked. The Danes

didn’t even react. Had it been a French overseas

territory, the meeting would have been terminated.

Or there would have been a war.” Knowing explosive

conflict from ritual and ritual from coordinated

performance takes practice.

Foreign diplomats are bound to find themselves part of

mishaps integral to these games. They soon develop

strategies to approach Danes and Greenlanders. ”We

believe that we have pretty good goggles allowing us

to see through the fog”, one says. Sometimes, it comes

down to a choice between what Greenlanders want to

protect and expand their autonomy, or what the Danish

constitution prescribes. Some foreign powers are

more at liberty than others to overstep red lines by

honest mistakes or by hiding behind faked ignorance.

Either way, to be in this constitutional grey zone,

accepting occasional faux pas is necessary.

Manage the optics

Optics can be managed in creative ways to take sides

or to make ends meet: Having three flags in a meeting

room or arranging only two flagpoles. Complex

speaking orders. Denmark signing a trilateral

agreement which authorizes Greenland to sign a

bilateral agreement. Leading guests away to sign in

separate ceremonies. Photo shoots allowing different

people center stage.

METHODS AND CLAIM

This brief is based on two dozen interviews and conver-

sations with diplomats and officials; Greenlandic, Danish,

and foreign. Some quotes have been slightly redacted to

ensure anonymity. Nothing in the brief should be taken

as legal opinion or a claim to have uncovered ’who really

did what when’; rather, the analysis aims to show how

conflicting claims about legitimacy and truth set the

scene for diplomacy in Nuuk.

One confusing optic remains that the US consulate

temporarily moved in with the Danish Joint Arctic

Command while scouring Nuuk’s overheated real

estate market for suitable office space. The landlord

satisfies US’ demands for physical security and runs

the most secure signal connection in town. But the

arrangement also feeds into the ’cat and mouse’

games: The consulate staff asserts that they deal only

with the civilian agenda devolved to Nuuk. But the

consulate also does advance work for visitors from the

Pentagon. So, in private, a Danish official may seek to

conciliate worries over US advances to Greenland by

hinting that cohabitation allows an ”eye to be kept on”

the guests. Others, to the contrary, wonder if sharing

the address signifies Danish submission to US

designs.

Manpower and ownership

Greenland’s mantra is ”Nothing about us without us”.

However, as one diplomat notes, ”That’s easy to say, but

the reach needs to be negotiated every day when the

Arctic is one item among twenty on the agenda of all

kinds of fora, wide and narrow.” Moreover, each new

Greenlandic envoy abroad generates work back in Nuuk.

The recent American offensive consumed almost all

the bandwidth of the tiny Department of Foreign

Affairs. But institutionalization has redirected the

offensive, as a Greenlandic diplomat notes, ”the

opening of the US consulate is a relief: at least they

can organize their own delegations’ itineraries”. Thus,

foreign attention is redirected to government offices in

charge of specific cooperation projects and programs.

But everyone in Nuuk is tied up. Every August,

politicians suffer from ’delegation fatigue’ when

colleagues from abroad all want to visit. Foreign

journalists find it difficult to get anyone to pick up the

phone. Mailboxes at the university overflow with

invitations to research projects on Arctic security. Even

the human resources of the operational staff at the

Joint Arctic Command are strained by increasing

numbers of visiting vessels to be engaged in exercises.

Greenland’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs featured an image in social

media postings of the premier of Greenland briefing the press with

the US Secretary of State in an Air Greenland hangar - while most

press photos also allowed the Danish Minister of Foreign Affairs a

seat at the table. (2021)

The first US consul to Nuuk since 1953 raises Stars and Stripes.

His landlord, the Commander of the Danish Joint Arctic Command

salutes (2020).

A crowd gathered to celebrate the opening of the Consulate General

of Iceland in a picturesque house in the old colonial harbor (2013).

1941

Danish colony

closed to outsiders

WWII: US takes over

1945

Cold War: external relations

handled in Copenhagen

1979

New ’home rule’

government relates abroad

1985

Greenland celebrates EU officials

visiting to negotiate fish

2001

2009

The US Thule radar upgrade means a Danish diplomacy invites Asia to engage

breakthrough for Greenland in security.

Greenland’s enhanced autonomy.

Arctic sceneries stage Greenland as

co-host for Danish climate diplomacy

Nuuk appears as a diplomatic scene

Decades ago, if Greenlandic authorities wanted to engage the world, they would begin by flying to Copenhagen. Now, Nuuk is a diplomatic scene.

GRU, Alm.del - 2022-23 (2. samling) - Bilag 16: DIIS POLICY BRIEF SEPTEMBER 2022: NUUK AS A DIPLOMATIC SCENE: PROTOCOL, PITFALLS, AND PRACTICE

DIIS POLICY BRIEF SEPTEMBER 2022

Hence, success in Nuuk involves a flexible approach to

resources and ownership. One project invitation was

framed by the specification that ”Equal partnership

need not mean everyone contribute exactly the same.

We will pay; you just need to contribute your time.” But

often, time is a sparser resource than money. As one

deputy minister remarked at the prospect of EU

planning an office in Nuuk: ”I do not have two desk

officers idly waiting to write up projects for the EU to

finance.” Hence, a diplomat may lament that, ”We invite

and engage, but nothing meaningful comes back.”

The job market for trilinguals with a degree is read hot.

Moreover, foreign missions seeking to recruit locals

need to negotiate politics: First, some candidates

experience being quizzed by acquaintances and

counterparts over the political signals they send by

serving this or that foreign country (or even Denmark).

Second, recruiters may comb through heaps of SoMe

postings to understand - and try to redact - the political

luggage many candidates bring, since political and

professional elites inevitably overlap in tiny societies.

So even if newcomers bring manpower and resources,

competition for attention and ownership is tough.

Know Nuuk’s place in the networks

Nuuk is neither home to real embassies nor to mere

Nuuk provincial consulates. So even if Nuuk posting

involves standard diplomatic craftsmanship, the

standard lines of communication seldom work. A

foreign diplomat in Nuuk might in principle refer to an

embassy in Copenhagen, but in practice lines are often

open directly from shopfloors in Nuuk to top floors in

the capital back home.

Even Danish authorities have had to think out of the

box when expanding their presence in Nuuk. The High

Commissioner refers to the Prime Minister’s office, so

the Ministry of Foreign Affairs want their own Nuuk

posting even if it is formally ’domestic’. Ministry of

Defense officers fly in on occasion so they ”stay in the

loop” in Copenhagen. The Commander of the Joint

Arctic Command must welcome top brass and naval

ships to Nuuk; however, most of his diplomatic tasks

involve flying (via Copenhagen) to allied capitals.

Meanwhile, disregarding the new Danish liaisons in

Nuuk, Greenlandic officials often prefer talking directly

to their bosses in Copenhagen, as they have been

used to.

It might be necessary to be present at Nuuk’s new

diplomatic scene. But to be relevant takes knowing the

networks into which Nuuk is spun.

Who’s at Nuuk’s

diplomatic scene

Government of Greenland Department of Foreign Affairs

Parliament Committee on Foreign and Security Policy

Danish Ministries of State, Foreign Affairs, Defense

US Consulate

Consulate General of Iceland

EU Commission

Honorary Consuls

+ more and more visiting ministers, ambassadors, etc.

16 in home service

4 + operational staff

soon: 2-3

Greenland desks

in Copenhagen

Greenland diplomats

abroad

Ministries of State, Foreign Affairs, Defense, Justice

Copenhagen, Reykjavik, Washington, Beijing, Brussels (EU + planned: NATO)

Author:

Photo page 3:

Ulrik Pram Gad, senior researcher, [email protected]

Ttop to bottom: Leiff Josefsen/Sermitsiaq; Malik Brøns/KNR, Rasmus Olsvig/Department of Communication,

Prime Minister’s Office, Government of Greenland

Coverillustration: Sara Maritta Brasse

This publication is part of the Defence and Security Studies at DIIS. All DIIS Policy Briefs are printed on Ecolabel and FSC certified paper