Members of the European Arctic Summit meet in Rovaniemi, Finland.
Twelve European countries meeting in Finland on Sept. 14 urged the European Union to beef up its presence in the Arctic, a geopolitical battleground caught between Russia and U.S. President Donald Trump.
“We call for the European Union to take on a more strategic and proactive role in the European Arctic,” the countries’ leaders wrote in a joint statement following a European-Arctic Summit in the town of Rovaniemi in Finnish Lapland, attended by Denmark, France, Germany, Greece and Sweden, among others.
Trump’s repeated threats to bring Greenland, a vast, autonomous Danish territory, under U.S. control have triggered a diplomatic crisis among Washington’s allies.
While his tone has cooled since the beginning of the year, EU countries are determined to increase their presence in the region, well aware of a hostile neighbor on the other side of Finland’s long eastern border.
Pointing to “the significant and long-term threat Russia poses,” countries said Moscow’s ambitions to increase its influence in the Arctic and its “hostility towards Europe, including the increase in hybrid activities, highlight the need to strengthen the EU’s Arctic policy.”
Officials present included Germany’s Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas and EU Council President Antonio Costa, as well as leaders from countries such as Romania and Greece.
“What happens here is not a regional story. It is a European one,” Costa said.
No formal decisions were to be taken at the summit.
But it comes as the European Commission is expected to present a new Arctic strategy in a matter of weeks, which will steer the union’s approach to the Arctic over the coming years.
