The offer had singularly refreshed relations between the White House and Copenhagen. In the summer of 2019, US President Donald Trump proposed that the United States buy Greenland, an autonomous territory under Danish sovereignty. On the side of the island of 56,000 inhabitants, four times larger than France, a certain pragmatism prevailed. “We are not for sale”, replied, on Twitterthe local government, specifying however to be “ready to do business”.
The interest of the great powers for Greenland and the riches of its subsoil rightly inspired Adam Price, creator of the Danish series Borgen. After nine years of absence, this political fiction, acclaimed by critics and broadcast in more than 70 countries, returns for a darker and more international fourth season, accessible from June 2 on the Netflix platform. We find its heroine, Birgitte Nyborg (played by Sidse Babett Knudsen), a shrewd and ambitious centrist, at the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Nordic kingdom, after having been its Prime Minister during the first two seasons.
At the heart, this time, of the story: the discovery of an oil deposit off the coast of Greenland. For the local government, this loot is the best way to emancipate itself from the Danish colonizer. With mastery, these new episodes evoke a Russian military threat, the constant pressure of the American ally and the appetite of the Chinese communist regime for raw materials, while insisting on the environmental damage of human activities. So many themes resonating with the unique situation of Greenland.
“Since a law on autonomy in 2009, island elected officials have control over resources (hydrocarbons, metal, precious stones), recalls Mikaa Mered, secretary general of the overseas chair of Sciences po Paris and author of the polar worlds (PUF, 2019). But the issue of their exploitation has tended to make and break its governments.” While filming the final season of Borgenthe project for a mine of rare earths and uranium on the Kvanefjeld site, led by an Australian company supported by a Chinese group, thus caused the fall of the executive in place.
Resulting from the April 2021 elections, the new executive has put an end to all uranium mining projects on the island – because of the risks of radioactivity. “A new political generation is imposing itself in Greenland and it is not ready to sacrifice its environment or its identity to gain independence”, argues Mikaa Mered. Prime Minister Mute Egede has pledged to ratify the Paris agreement. He also passed a law prohibiting all oil prospecting. A change of direction against the scenario of Borgen.