Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at an upcoming referendum in Iceland, more potential flooding in Nepal and Tibet, and looming trilateral defensive drills against North Korean threats.

Will Iceland Start Fishing in a Larger Pond?

Icelanders will head to the polls on Saturday to vote on whether to restart talks to join the European Union. As U.S. President Donald Trump’s repeated threats to seize neighboring Greenland loom over Reykjavik, the tiny Nordic nation is considering discarding its genial global reputation to seek European protection from the White House’s imperial-esque ambitions.

Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at an upcoming referendum in Iceland, more potential flooding in Nepal and Tibet, and looming trilateral defensive drills against North Korean threats.

Will Iceland Start Fishing in a Larger Pond?

Icelanders will head to the polls on Saturday to vote on whether to restart talks to join the European Union. As U.S. President Donald Trump’s repeated threats to seize neighboring Greenland loom over Reykjavik, the tiny Nordic nation is considering discarding its genial global reputation to seek European protection from the White House’s imperial-esque ambitions.

Following the 2008 global financial crisis, Iceland applied for EU membership. The process stalled within just a few years amid concerns that it could lead to the country losing sovereignty over its territorial fishing waters. However, accession talks have been brought back to the table as the Arctic transforms into a hotbed of critical mineral competition and a focal point of the Trump administration’s foreign-policy agenda.

Trump triggered a NATO crisis in January, when he threatened to take control of resource-rich Greenland either through economic coercion or military force. NATO chief Mark Rutte eventually convinced the White House to back off, negotiating a framework deal that included greater U.S. access to the Danish territory. However, the incident cast light on Europe’s weakening relationship with Washington, and it exposed new vulnerabilities in the Nordic region.

“The international system we have lived with since the end of World War II is shaking,” Icelandic Foreign Minister Thorgerdur Katrin Gunnarsdottir wrote in a recent report on the value........

© Foreign Policy