European Commission chief promises unity on Greenland
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This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Andrew Peach and it's 16 Hours GMT on Tuesday the 20th of January. These are our main stories. European leaders speak at the World Economic Forum in Davos with discussions dominated by the crisis over President Trump's ambition to annex Greenland. Rescue teams in Spain searched the wreckage of the two trains which crashed on Sunday, killing at least 41 people. Israel has begun demolishing the Jerusalem headquarters of UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees. Also in this podcast, despite everything China has done on our soil, China has been rewarded with exactly what they want, a super embassy that will be a base for espionage, not just in the UK, but likely across Europe as well.
Reaction to the British government's decision to approve China's new embassy in London, despite concerns it could be used for spying. The European Commission president has promised an unflinching European response to President Trump's threat to annex the Danish territory of Greenland. Ursula von der Leyen was speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, which has been dominated by the crisis in transatlantic relations.
We consider the people of the United States not just our allies, but our friends. And plunging us into a downward spiral would only aid the very adversaries we are both so committed to keeping out of the strategic landscape. So our response will be unflinching, united and proportional.
Ms von der Leyen says the bloc should prepare for seismic change.
Playing for time. And hoping for things to revert soon will not fix the structural dependencies we have. So my point is, if this change is permanent, then Europe must change permanently too. It is time to seize this opportunity and build a new independent Europe.
President Trump has fired off more social media posts as he continues to ramp up the rhetoric over Greenland, including an image of him planting the US flag there.
We have to have it. They have to have this done. They can't protect it. Denmark, they're wonderful people. And I know the leaders, they're very good people, but they don't even go there. And, you know, because the boat went there 500 years ago and then left, that doesn't give you title to property.
President Trump says his trip to Davos is going to be interesting. Our economics editor Faisal Islam is already there and gave us this assessment of what might lie ahead. We're here at the World Economic Forum Congress Centre. They get around with these strange sort of cowbell sounding mini buggies. The world's elite, financiers, the odd journalists and some world leaders too. one person that everyone's waiting for, Donald J. Trump. And he may be reminded with the freezing cold weather of a place called Greenland. So this is a new development for Davos. There's a kind of famous church that's just outside the main security cordon that's normally taken over by businesses. This year, Giant Eagles, Big Flames, USA House.
And... We've been hearing from some of Trump's allies. Scott Besson, the Treasury Secretary, has already spoken, saying that it would be a bad idea for Europe to retaliate. But it also caught up with a former Donald Trump advisor, who is now the vice president of IBM, inventing quantum computers. He knows Donald Trump well. And so what he told me about Greenland, worth listening to, and fairly extraordinary.
I think at the end of the day, Greenland is an independent country. It was part of NATO.
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