Icebergs in the Ilulissat Icefjord loom behind buildings on August 4, 2019 in Ilulissat, Greenland. (Sean Gallup/Getty Images)
BOSTON (WBZ NewsRadio) — According to a report by the Wall Street Journal Thursday, President Donald Trump has asked his staff several times about the possibility of buying Greenland.
Friday morning, the island territory responded, saying that wasn't going to happen.
"#Greenland is rich in valuable resources such as minerals, the purest water and ice, fish stocks, seafood, renewable energy and is a new frontier for adventure tourism," the twitter account for Greenland's Ministry of Foreign Affairs posted. "We're open for business, not for sale."
Greenland, which had a population of 55,877 as of January 2018, is an autonomous country that has largely ruled itself since 1979 but still answers to the Danish crown.
The news that Trump might want to buy the territory stunned many, including former Danish Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen, who tweeted he thought it was an "April Fools' Day joke."
Believe it or not, it isn't the first time a U.S. president thought about purchasing Greenland. In 1946, the Truman Administration startled the Danish foreign minister when they offered to buy the island territory as part of a Cold War defense strategy. Long before that, in 1867, Secretary of State William Seward was interested in purchasing the territory from Denmark. The last time the United States purchased territory from the Danes was in 1917, when it purchased the Danish Virgin Islands of St. Thomas and St. John.
Perhaps President Trump and the Danish government can discuss Greenland when Trump visits Copenhagen in September.
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