After years of discrimination the Inuit, the indigenous people of the Arctic who make up most of the population, could break away from Denmark
On a snowy hilltop overlooking a windswept bay in Nuuk, the tiny capital of Greenland, is a statue of the Christian missionary who led an expedition to colonise this vast island for Denmark in 1721. Three centuries on, after years of discrimination by Copenhagen against the local population, many Greenlanders wish that Hans Egede had never set sail.
Among the most vocal critics of Danish policies is Pele Broberg, the leader of Naleraq, an opposition party that is pushing hard for independence. “We have nothing in common with Denmark.
Nothing. We don’t have the same culture. We don’t have the same language. Nothing. What we have is systemic racism,” Broberg, a former foreign minister, said at his office in Greenland’s parliament, a small, two-storey building near Nuuk’s icy harbour.
