GREENLANDIC WOMEN SUE DENMARK OVER INVOLUNTARY CONTRACEPTION IN THE 1960S AND 1970S

A mural depicting an Inuit woman and a polar bear in Nuuk, Greenland.

Thu 07 March 2024:

Greenland’s Indigenous women have opted to sue Denmark for failing to meet their compensation claim of roughly 43 million kroner (approximately $6.3 million) for forcing them to use involuntary birth control in the 1960s and 1970s, Danish and Greenland media reported on Monday.

Nearly 150 Greenlandic women have sued the Danish state, alleging that they were fitted with the contraceptive coil without their consent or knowledge.

The aggrieved women filed a compensation demand with Denmark in Oct. 2023 and are now taking the country to court after receiving no response.

Some of the women, including teenagers at the time, claimed that Denmark did not obtain their consent for their actions and that some were not even aware of what happened.

Denmark has admitted in the past that between the 1960s and mid-1970s, up to 4,500 women were forced to have coil implants, accounting for nearly half of all fertile women in Greenland, to limit their birth rates.

Naja Lyberth, who was the first woman to come forward to say that she had been fitted with a coil during a state medical examination as a young teenager without her consent, has accused the state of concerted sterilisation.

Accusing the government of “dragging out the time”, Lyberth said the women, the oldest of whom is now over 80 years old, cannot wait any longer.

She told the Greenlandic broadcasting corporation, Kalaallit Nunaata Radioa (KNR): “As long as we live, we want to regain our self-respect and respect for our wombs. There is no government to decide whether we should have children or not.”

Denmark and Greenland opened an investigation over the allegations in September 2022. The investigation’s results are anticipated to be made public next year. Copenhagen gave mental counseling to those impacted.

Greenland was a Danish colony until 1953, when it became a province of the Scandinavian country. The country was granted home rule in 1979, and three decades later, it became self-governing. Denmark, on the other hand, retains control over its foreign and defense policies.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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