Greenland raw materials have become part of the security framework agreed with Denmark and the USA. The agreement signed on 22 September does not give Washington ownership of Greenland’s mineral resources or exclusive rights to develop them, but it introduces new security rules for foreign investments in sensitive sectors, explicitly including critical infrastructure and resource extraction.
Under the agreement signed by Greenland, Denmark and the USA, investors linked to countries that are neither members of NATO, NATO partners nor EU member states will face restrictions if their control, significant influence or access to non-public information could threaten national security or public order.
The provision connects two issues that have increasingly overlapped in Greenland: the island’s large mineral potential and its strategic importance in the Arctic.
Greenland raw materials are treated as a security issue
The agreement defines “particularly sensitive sectors or activities” as including, but not limited to, critical infrastructure and the extraction of resources.
It says Greenland must ensure that investors covered by the restrictions cannot obtain control or significant influence, or sensitive non-public information, where this could pose a security or public-order risk.
This does not amount to a general ban on investment from every country outside the Western alliance system. The agreement allows exceptions when the parties determine that a specific activity does not represent a threat.
It also does not give the USA sole authority to decide which investments can proceed. The text says that Greenland will implement the provision through its current or future investment-screening legislation, in close cooperation with Danish authorities. Denmark will in turn consult closely with USA authorities and other partners.
This distinction matters because President Donald Trump had presented the agreement in broader terms before it was signed. According to TV 2’s coverage of his UN General Assembly speech, Trump said adversaries would not be allowed to make sensitive investments in Greenland without American approval.
The published text establishes a more structured system based on Greenlandic legislation and consultation among the parties rather than a unilateral USA veto.
Greenland still has to build its investment-screening system
The agreement also arrives while Greenland is still developing the domestic legislation needed to screen foreign investments.
A previous proposal for a general investment-screening law was withdrawn during Inatsisartut’s spring session. The legislation was intended to allow Naalakkersuisut to intervene when foreign investments could threaten Greenland’s security or public order, including in sectors such as mineral resources and critical infrastructure.
A new proposal is now on the agenda of Inatsisartut, Greenland’s parliament. The current parliamentary schedule sets its first reading for 10 November 2026, with the second and third readings expected during the spring 2027 session.
The security agreement therefore creates an international commitment at a moment when Greenland has not yet completed the domestic legal framework through which that commitment is expected to operate.
The earlier legislative proposal made clear why Naalakkersuisut wanted such a system. It said Greenland needed a way to assess foreign investments in particularly sensitive sectors while maintaining an investment environment capable of attracting international capital.
Greenland has many of the raw materials Europe considers critical
The investment provision matters because Greenland has become increasingly important in international discussions about critical mineral supply chains.
The European Commission says that 25 of the 34 raw materials it classifies as critical can be found in Greenland. They include materials used across the energy transition, digital technologies and advanced industries.
That geological potential does not mean that all of those resources are currently being mined or that every identified deposit can be developed commercially. Building mines in Greenland can require major investments in infrastructure, transport and energy, as well as lengthy environmental and permitting processes.
But the potential has already made raw materials an important part of Greenland’s relationships with both Europe and North America.
In 2023, Greenland and the EU established a strategic partnership on sustainable raw-material value chains, aimed at developing projects, infrastructure, skills and processing capacity while integrating Greenland more closely into European supply chains.
That cooperation was expanded again this month. On 7 September, the European Commission announced a €200 million EU-Greenland partnership package covering areas including connectivity, sustainable energy and critical raw materials.
The agreement does not reserve Greenland’s minerals for the USA
The wording of the new security agreement is important for Europe.
The restrictions specifically concern investors from states that fall outside three groups: NATO members, NATO partners and EU member states.
EU companies are therefore not placed in the category targeted by the new provision simply because they are European rather than American. The agreement does not establish an exclusive USA right to Greenland’s minerals and does not replace Greenland’s existing raw-material partnership with the EU.
Instead, it effectively divides investment according to security relationships.
This gives Greenland room to continue attracting capital from European, North American and other allied partners while creating a mechanism for closer scrutiny of investments associated with countries outside those frameworks.
The agreement itself does not name China, Russia or any other country in its investment provisions. It refers more generally to efforts by “adversaries” to increase influence and control in Greenland.
Investors have already reacted to the agreement
Financial markets began reacting even before the agreement was formally signed.
After the deal was announced, Sermitsiaqs reported sharp rises in several USA-listed companies with Greenland-related projects. On Monday, Greenland Energy rose 127 percent, Greenland Mines 136 percent and Critical Metals Corp 33 percent.
Critical Metals is particularly relevant to the raw-material debate because it controls the Tanbreez rare-earth project in southern Greenland. Earlier this year, the company signed a 15-year agreement with USA-based REalloys covering part of the planned production from the project.
The share-price movements show how investors interpreted the security agreement, but they do not themselves change mining licences or guarantee that individual projects will proceed.
Greenland retains authority over the development of its mineral sector.
Raw materials are becoming part of Greenland’s security policy
The most important change is therefore not that the USA has acquired Greenland’s resources.
It is that who invests in Greenland’s resources has formally become a security question within the wider defence relationship between Greenland, Denmark and the USA.
The agreement puts resource extraction alongside military installations, espionage, critical infrastructure and Arctic defence as an area in which geopolitical considerations can affect future decisions.
At the same time, the wording preserves an important distinction between security cooperation and economic control. Greenland will apply the investment rules through its own legislation, EU investors remain outside the category specifically targeted by the restrictions, and the existing EU-Greenland raw-material partnership continues alongside the new USA security framework.
The next important step will therefore take place in Nuuk rather than Washington: Inatsisartut still has to decide what Greenland’s own investment-screening system will look like and how the commitments contained in the new agreement will be translated into domestic law.
