Some three years ago, a Danish public radio podcast brought to light one of the darkest chapters in relations between Denmark and Greenland: the so-called IUD scandal. The podcast made public a Danish government program that forced thousands of young women in Greenland, many of them minors, to have intrauterine devices (IUD coils) inserted into their wombs as a form of compulsory birth control in the 1960s and 1970s.

Although Greenland — which is mostly populated by indigenous Inuit — was no longer a Danish colony after 1953, it was nevertheless not independent, but rather a Danish province. It was not until 1979 that Greenland got its own parliament and government. And despite enjoying a certain amount of autonomy, it did not have self-administration laws until 2009. Today, Greenland still belongs to Denmark.

Denmark's forced contraception policy aimed to put an end to what Copenhagen viewed as excessive numbers of children born out of wedlock in Greenland as well as slowing overall birthrates on the island. Speaking with DW, Henriette Berthelsen recalls how she and her classmates were sent to public health officers without their parents' knowledge.

"Lots of girls began crying in the waiting room. We were so young and we never had anything to do with boys. The (IUD) coils that they put in us were big, they were made for grown women. I can still remember the terrible pain."

Berthelsen and other affected women sued the Danish government last year, demanding compensation and an official apology. That is because the forced contraception policy led to........

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