By Caitlin Doornbos
Native Greenlander Amarok Peterson was 27 years old when she learned the gut-wrenching truth about why she couldn’t have children — and that Denmark was to blame.
At 13, she became one of hundreds of Greenlandic girls subjected to forced sterilization by Danish doctors who implanted an IUD in her womb without her knowledge.
“The Danes don’t see us as humans,” Petersen told The Post in a local Inuit restaurant overlooking Nuuk’s famous fjords. “They think we’re too expensive, too small a population. But they take our land, our children, our lives and expect thanks.”
While the government of Denmark officially apologized last year for decades of forced contraception of Indigenous women and girls, the horrific mistreatment has cast a long shadow on the island that has become the center of an international ownership fight.
This week, the Danes hosted European troops for military exercises on Greenland, asserting they are protecting the island from outside powers — particularly the United States. But for many Inuit, Denmark itself has long been the real threat.
“I will never have children,” Petersen said, with tears of anger and sorrow welling in her eyes. “That choice was taken from me.”
Even in adulthood, medical decisions were made without her consent. Plagued with problems after the IUD, she had repeated surgeries for unexplained pain. It wasn’t until years later that doctors informed her that her fallopian tubes had been removed in one of the operations in the early 2000s.
Her family also suffered under Denmark’s so-called “Little Danes experiment,” in which Greenlandic children were forcibly sent to Denmark for adoption or institutional care — often permanently separated from their families, she said.
The program, which ran from the 1950s through the 1970s, was part of Denmark’s broader effort to assimilate Greenlandic children, often without parental consent.
It happened to her mother’s brother, Petersen said. Other relatives were subjected to medical experimentation, she added.
“They wanted us smaller,” she said. “Easier to manage.”
Denmark recently announced compensation for victims of forced sterilization, but Petersen called the payments another insult. Announced in December, the women are being offered about $46,000 in reparations.
“They think we are worth pennies,” she said. “They destroyed generations, and now they say, ‘Here — be quiet.’”
‘Greenland is for Greenlanders’ — but controlled by Denmark
As the United States renews interest in Greenland — with President Trump recently expressing a desire to buy the island — Danish officials have repeatedly emphasized that “Greenland is not for sale.” But many Greenlanders argue that slogan masks a deeper truth: Denmark still governs Greenland, not Greenlanders themselves.
Greenlanders interviewed by The Post said they are not ready to swap Denmark for US ownership, as Trump has prioritized; they want independence after years of what some described as generations of trauma, displacement and economic exploitation that still shape daily life across the island.
“People say ‘Greenland is for Greenlanders,’” Petersen said. “But that’s not reality. Denmark speaks for us. Denmark decides. They don’t let us speak.”
That imbalance was visible recently in Washington, where the Danish foreign minister dominated nearly the entire press conference following talks with US officials, while the Greenlandic foreign minister was largely sidelined.
Foreign Minister Lars Rasmussen of Denmark insisted the roughly 56,000 Greenlanders wouldn’t be bought off by payments from the US or vote in a referendum to become American.
“There’s no way that US will pay for a Scandinavian welfare system in Greenland,” he told Fox News.
For many Greenlanders, US interest has been uncomfortable — but also clarifying. Not because they want annexation, but because it exposes how little autonomy Greenland actually has.
“It was colonial,” Petersen said of Rasmussen’s assertions. “You could see it in his body language. He didn’t want her to speak.