Well, I guess Denmark is off the hook.
~Puts away bow and arrow.~
Hans Island, also called Tartupaluk, lies midway between Canada’s Ellesmere Island and Danish territory of Greenland
www.theglobeandmail.com
Canada and Denmark have reached a settlement in a decades-old border dispute over Hans Island, a 1.3-square-kilometre rock in the Arctic sea passage between Greenland and Ellesmere Island, sources say.
Back in 1983, Canada issued a land-use permit to a Canadian petroleum company to establish a scientific camp on Hans Island that would study how sea ice might affect drilling rigs, Prof. Byers said. In 1984, Tom Hoyem
, then the Danish minister for Greenland, flew to Hans Island by helicopter and planted a Danish flag, prompting the Canadian government to issue a diplomatic protest, he added.
Additional Danish flag plants – and Canadian protests – followed in 1988, 1995, 2002, 2003 and 2004, Prof. Byers said. In 2000, a team of geologists from the Geographical Society of Canada visited the island, mapped its location and took geological samples.
In 2004, the Wall Street Journal quoted Peter Taksoe-Jensen, legal adviser to the Danish foreign minister about how both countries maintained a sense of humour throughout the dispute:
“When Danish military go there, they leave a bottle of schnapps. And when [Canadian] military forces come there, they leave a bottle of Canadian Club [whisky] and a sign saying, ‘Welcome to Canada.’ ”