Danes march to protest Trump’s NATO comments, Greenland efforts

Jan. 31 (UPI) — Danish military veterans and others staged a protest march against U.S. President Donald Trump‘s recent comments regarding NATO members and Greenland.

Trump criticized the amount of support the United States received from NATO allies during recent conflicts, and many veterans and others in Denmark took to the streets on Saturday to show their displeasure.

One protester, Danish Lance Cpl. Soren Teigen, said only the president is responsible for the comments.

“I don’t blame American soldiers in any way — we’ve fought side by side, and we still do,” Teigen told The New York Times. “But when the president says something like this, of course it hurts.”

Trump earlier accused NATO allies of shying away from fighting after sending their troops to Afghanistan but allegedly keeping them away from the front lines.

Officials with Danish Veterans & Veteran Support took exception to the president’s comments.

“Denmark has always stood side by side with the USA, and we have shown up in the world’s crisis zones when the USA has asked us to,” the group said in a prepared statement.

“We feel let down and ridiculed by the Trump administration, which is deliberately disregarding Denmark’s combat side by side with the USA,” it added.

Many veterans and other Danes also are unhappy with the president’s efforts to annex or otherwise control Greenland.

Hundreds of Danish military veterans on Saturday quietly marched to outside the U.S. Embassy in Copenhagen, where some placed 44 small Danish flags in planters located nearby.

The flags are to commemorate the 44 Danish military personnel who died in Afghanistan.

U.S. Embassy staff members were unaware of the flags’ meaning and initially removed them, which further upset many Danes.

Upon learning what the flags represented, the embassy staff left alone any that remained or were replaced.