Denmark summoned the top U.S. diplomat in the country for an explanation following a Wall Street Journal report about the United States stepping up its intelligence gathering on Greenland, a semi-autonomous Danish territory coveted by President Donald Trump.

Officials summoned the American ambassador to express its displeasure after the Trump Administration was said be ratcheting up surveillance.

Denmark's foreign minister says he will summon the US ambassador to address a report that Washington's spy agencies have been told to focus on Greenland amid Donald Trump's threats to take over the island. "It worries me greatly because we do not spy on friends," Lars Løkke Rasmussen said, responding to the report in The Wall Street Journal.