France has warned Donald Trump not to threaten the European Union's "sovereign borders" after the US president-elect refused to rule out military action to take control of Greenland, an autonomous territory of EU member Denmark.
"There can be no question of the EU allowing other countries in the world, whoever they may be ... to attack its sovereign borders," Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot told France Inter radio.
"We are a strong continent. We must strengthen ourselves even more," he urged.
Barot described Greenland as "European territory". Greenland is linked to the European Union through Denmark.
In a rambling news conference, Trump did not rule out military intervention to take control of the Panama Canal and Greenland.
"We need Greenland for national security purposes," he said.
His statement coincided with his son Donald Trump Jr's private visit to the mineral- and oil-rich autonomous Danish territory.
"If you ask me, 'Is the United States going to invade Greenland,' the answer is no," Barrot said, but warned, "We have entered an era where the right of the fittest is returning. Should we be scared? Should we be worried? Obviously, no."
"We must wake up and strengthen ourselves, militarily, in competition, in a world where the law of the strongest prevails," the French foreign minister said.
Barrot believes the United States "is not inherently imperialist."
At the press conference, Trump called the border with the United States' northern neighbor Canada an "artificially drawn line" and vowed to rename the Gulf of Mexico the "Gulf of America." | BGNES, AFP
