What The Hell America!

Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at an upcoming U.S. trip to Greenland, Russia and Ukraine agreeing in principle to Black Sea cease-fire deals, and the end to Japan’s Unification Church.

‘Highly Aggressive’

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen accused the United States on Tuesday of exerting “unacceptable pressure” on Greenland ahead of an unsolicited trip by top U.S. officials to the island on Thursday. “The visit is clearly not about what Greenland needs or wants,” Frederiksen said. U.S. President Donald “Trump is serious. He wants Greenland. Therefore, [this visit] cannot be seen independently of anything else.”

Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at an upcoming U.S. trip to Greenland, Russia and Ukraine agreeing in principle to Black Sea cease-fire deals, and the end to Japan’s Unification Church.

‘Highly Aggressive’

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen accused the United States on Tuesday of exerting “unacceptable pressure” on Greenland ahead of an unsolicited trip by top U.S. officials to the island on Thursday. “The visit is clearly not about what Greenland needs or wants,” Frederiksen said. U.S. President Donald “Trump is serious. He wants Greenland. Therefore, [this visit] cannot be seen independently of anything else.”

On Sunday, the White House announced a surprise private trip to the semiautonomous Danish territory, led by second lady Usha Vance; White House National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, who is currently embroiled in a scandalous national security breach; and Energy Secretary Chris Wright. The three-day visit aims to “learn about Greenland, its culture, history, and people,” White House National Security Council spokesperson Brian Hughes said.

But the governments of Denmark and Greenland have disputed the Trump administration’s claim. “You cannot make a private visit with official representatives from another country,” Frederiksen said. Outgoing Greenlandic Prime Minister Mute Egede went a step further, labeling the visit a “provocation” and “highly aggressive,” as it comes just days before Nuuk holds coalition talks and municipal elections.

“For the record, the Greenlandic government has not issued any invitations for visits, either official or private,” the government said in an official statement. “The current government is acting as an interim government pending the formation of a new coalition, and we have kindly requested all countries to respect this process.”

But Trump appears to be working on his own timeline. On Monday, the U.S. president reiterated his desire for the United States to acquire Greenland, saying the upcoming trip is “friendliness, not provocation” and falsely adding that Nuuk authorities invited Washington to visit.

Trump maintains that U.S. control of the island is an “absolute necessity” for U.S. national security, and he has refused to rule out using military force or economic coercion to get what he wants. The White House is interested in Greenland’s vast mineral wealth as well as its geographic opportunities; the island is strategically located for U.S. ballistic missile systems.

“One way or the other, we’re going to get it,” Trump said this month.

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What We’re Following

Black Sea diplomacy. The White House announced on Tuesday that it had made deals with Russia and Ukraine regarding military action in the Black Sea in a step toward a future peace agreement to end the three-year conflict. The deals were the result of back-to-back separate U.S. meetings with Russian and Ukrainian officials in Saudi Arabia over the past three days.

According to White House statements, both Moscow and Kyiv have agreed to “ensure safe navigation, eliminate the use of force, and prevent the use of commercial vessels for military purposes in the Black Sea.” Both countries also agreed to develop measures to implement a 30-day pause on energy infrastructure strikes to eventually secure a “durable and lasting peace.”

The United States said it also agreed to help restore Moscow’s access to the global market for its agriculture and fertilizer exports, lower maritime insurance costs, and enhance Russian access to ports and international payment systems.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told reporters on Tuesday that the United States had told the Ukrainian delegation that the cease-fires would be effective immediately. However, the Kremlin said it would only agree to a Black Sea deal if Washington issued an “order” to Zelensky to respect it. “We will need clear guarantees,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.

The Kremlin also said it would only implement the Black Sea agreement after the United States lifted sanctions on Russian banks involved in the international trade of agricultural exports. The Kremlin withdrew from the Black Sea Grain Initiative in 2023 over the West’s alleged failure to do so. The White House statements on Tuesday did not specifically mention lifting sanctions.

It is unclear if such caveats will derail the agreements. “It is too early to say that it will work, but these were the right meetings, the right decisions, the right steps,” Zelensky said on Tuesday.

With the Ukrainians, the White House reiterated its commitment to exchanging prisoners of war, releasing civilian detainees, and returning forcibly transferred Ukrainian children.

Disband order. A Japanese court on Tuesday ordered the Unification Church to dissolve following a yearslong investigation into its finances and tactics. In 2023, Japan’s education ministry accused the South Korea-based sect of manipulative fundraising and recruitment strategies that harmed its members, including convincing its followers to make massive donations.

Following the assassination of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in 2022, media reports uncovered extensive ties between the Unification Church and Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party; the man accused of killing Abe blamed the church for his family’s financial woes and said he targeted Abe because of his perceived support for the church.

Tuesday’s ruling will strip the organization of its legal status, taking away its tax-exempt privilege and requiring it to liquidate its assets. The court argued that disbandment was necessary because it did not believe that the Unification Church would voluntarily reform. The organization is expected to appeal the ruling.

Bolsonaro’s uncertain future. Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court began deliberations on Tuesday to determine whether former President Jair Bolsonaro and his allies should stand trial for allegedly staging a coup to try to oust President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva after the latter won the 2022 election. The five-judge panel is expected to decide by Wednesday. If the court rules in favor, then Bolsonaro will face a criminal trial.

Bolsonaro denies the charges and has called on his supporters to rally behind him.

The former president is already barred from running for reelection until 2030 for falsely claiming that Brasilia’s voting system was susceptible to fraud. Bolsonaro maintains that he will still seek the presidency during the country’s next election in 2026, saying any attempt to prevent him from doing so amounts to “political persecution.”

Odds and Ends

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. That’s good news for Psychrolutes marcidus, aka the “world’s ugliest animal.” Last week, New Zealand named the smooth-headed blobfish its fish of the year. Known for its distinctive appearance and slow-moving behavior, the bottom-feeder has become a regular fixture in meme culture. Conservationists hope the award will help bring attention to deep-sea trawling’s impacts on sensitive ecosystems and vulnerable fish populations.