Minerals, oil and trade Melting ice brings geopolitical jostling for Arctic assets

Lying between the US and Russia, Greenland has become a critical frontline as the Arctic opens up because of global heating.

- Ashley Kirk

Its importance has been underscored by Donald Trump openly considering attempts to take the island from America's Nato partner Denmark, either by buying it or by force.The climate crisis is shrinking Greenland's ice sheet, along with the Arctic sea ice, opening new sea routes and exposing resources.

Trump's threats, once dismissed as bluster but now taken seriously, are also seen as a signal of how melting ice is turning Greenland into a geopolitical flashpoint.

The average extent of sea ice in the Arctic over the past five years was 1.8m sq miles (4.6m sq km). This is roughly equivalent to the size of the EU. But this is a 27% reduction compared with the average of 2.5m sq miles between 1981 and 2010, according to data from the National Snow and Ice Data Center. The sea ice lost is equivalent to the size of Libya.

The shrinking ice means that, in the summer, the ice cap no longer reaches the Russian and Canadian coasts. And because there is no land beneath the north pole, it is exposing seas that were once inaccessible. This is opening up new shipping routes. Routes once limited to icebreakers have become commercial corridors.