Denmark sets up ‘night watch’ to monitor Trump since Greenland row | Greenland

The Danish government has set up a “night watch” in the foreign ministry, not to keep out the wildlings and White Walkers like the Night’s Watch of Game of Thrones, but rather to monitor Donald Trump’s pronouncements and movements while Copenhagen sleeps.

The night watch starts at 5pm each day and at 7am a report is produced and distributed around the Danish government and relevant departments about what was said and took place, the Politiken newspaper reported.

The position is understood to have to been introduced in the aftermath of the diplomatic row between Copenhagen and Washington over Greenland this spring, when the US president threatened to take control of the Arctic island.

Politiken said the initiative was one of several examples of how Danish diplomacy and the country’s civil service have had to adapt to the new reality of the second Trump administration.

A source close to the foreign office told the Guardian: “It is fair to say that the situation in Greenland and the time difference between Denmark and the United States was quite an important factor introducing this arrangement during the spring.”

Rather than everybody having to reach immediately for their phones to catch up on news from the US, the foreign office had instead made a “collective effort” to stay updated on Trump, the foreign office said.

Jacob Kaarsbo, a former chief analyst at the Danish defence intelligence agency, said the development showed, “as we have always known”, that the idea that the US was Denmark’s largest and most important ally was dead. “Alliances are built on common values and a common threat perception,” Kaarsbo said. “Trump shares nether of those with us and I would argue he doesn’t share it with most Europeans.”