Only Greenland and Denmark should decide the future of Greenland, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has told the BBC.

It comes after President Trump again said “we need Greenland from the standpoint of national security”.

The US president and senior members of his administration have repeatedly raised the prospect of the semi-autonomous Danish territory becoming an annexed part of the United States.

Both Greenland’s prime minister and Denmark’s prime minister strongly rejected the idea over the weekend.

Greenland’s Prime Minister Jens Frederik Nielsen responded to Trump’s latest comments by saying “that’s enough now” and described the notion of US control over the island as a “fantasy”.

Meanwhile, Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen had said “the US has no right to annex any of the three nations in the Danish kingdom”.

Asked whether he would also say to President Trump “hands off Greenland”, Sir Keir’s response was definitive, when so often in diplomacy answers are caveated and nuanced.

“Yes,” he replied. “Greenland and the Kingdom of Denmark must decide the future of Greenland and only Greenland and the Kingdom of Denmark. 

“And Denmark is a close ally in Europe, is a Nato ally and it is very important that the future of Greenland is for the Kingdom of Denmark and for Greenland themselves and only for Greenland and the Kingdom of Denmark.”

The prime minister’s language on the legality or otherwise of America’s seizing of the Venezuelan President and his wife in recent days was considerably less definitive.

“The US will have to justify the action it has taken,” Sir Keir said, adding that “we will always defend the international rule of law”.

But he repeatedly ducked offering a straight answer as to whether the US had acted within international law.

“There was an illegitimate president who has now been removed, and I don’t think anybody is really shedding any tears about that,” he said, calling for “a peaceful transition to democracy” as soon as possible.

The US military action has been criticised by some Labour MPs, as well as the leaders of the Liberal Democrats, Green Party and the SNP, who have called on the PM to condemn the move as a breach of international law.

On Sunday, Emily Thornberry, who chairs the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee, became the most senior Labour MP so far to do so.

She told BBC Radio 4’s Westminster Hour the US strikes were “not a legal action” and she “cannot think of anything that could be a proper justification”.

Describing the situation as “international anarchy”, she warned it risked emboldening Russia and China.

A handful of Labour MPs – mostly on the left of the party – have publicly condemned the US action for breaking international law so far.

However, more could criticise the UK’s response in the House of Commons later, when the foreign secretary gives a statement on the developments in Venezuela.

The UN Security Council, of which the UK is a permanent member, is meeting to discuss the US operation.

Venezuela’s left-wing president and his wife Cilia Flores were flown out of Caracas in a military operation in conjunction with US law enforcement.

They have since been charged with weapon and drug offences in New York, accused of enriching themselves from a violent crime ring smuggling cocaine to the US, and are expected to appear in court later.

Maduro has long rejected the allegations as a pretext to force him from power.