Russia Putin
Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a cabinet meeting via videoconference at the Kremlin, in Moscow, Russia, Wednesday, Jan. 21, 2026.
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As tensions simmered between the United States and Europe over President Donald Trump’s push to acquire Greenland, Russian officials, state-backed media and pro-Kremlin bloggers watched with a mixture of glee, gloating and wariness. Some touted Trump’s move as historic, while others said it weakens the European Union and NATO — something that Moscow would seem to welcome — and that it pushes Russia’s war in Ukraine to the sidelines for the West. Some noted the Arctic island held security and economic concerns for the U.S. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov also drew parallels between Trump’s bid for Greenland and the annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014, which many nations do not recognize as legal.
