European capitals may hit the US with 93 billion euros ($107.71bn) worth of tariffs or restrict American companies from the bloc’s market in response to US President Donald Trump’s threats to Nato allies opposed to his campaign to take over Greenland, the Financial Times reported yesterday.
The retaliation measures are being drawn up to give European leaders leverage in pivotal meetings with Trump at the World Economic Forum in Davos this week, the FT report said, citing officials involved in the preparations for the meetings in Switzerland.
Major European Union states including Germany and France decried Trump’s tariff threats over Greenland as blackmail yesterday, as France proposed responding with a range of untested economic countermeasures.
Trump vowed on Saturday to implement a wave of increasing tariffs on EU members Denmark, Sweden, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Finland, along with Britain and Norway, until the US is allowed to buy Greenland.
UK Prime Miniser Keir Starmer told Trump in a phone call yesterday that it would be ‘wrong’ to apply tariffs to allies opposing a US takeover of Greenland, said a report.
It is the first time the two leaders have spoken since the US president vowed to impose a 10 per cent levy on goods imported from eight European nations, including the UK, until a deal was reached for the US to purchase the island.
All eight countries, already subject to US tariffs have sent small numbers of military personnel to Denmark’s vast Arctic island and were set to meet early this morning.
“Tariff threats undermine transatlantic relations and risk a dangerous downward spiral,” they said in a joint statement.
The Danish exercise in Greenland was designed to strengthen Arctic security and posed no threat to anyone, they said, adding that they were ready to engage in dialogue, based on principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity.
Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said in a statement she was pleased with the consistent messages from other states, adding: ‘Europe will not be blackmailed’.
&uuid=(email))