Trump’s latest attack on UK ‘not normal’, says top Starmer ally after Chagos U-turn

One of Sir Keir Starmer’s closest allies has said Donald Trump’s approach to geopolitics is “not normal” after the US president launched a scathing attack on Britain’s Chagos Islands deal.

Mr Trump’s latest social media rant, on Tuesday morning, saw him describe the plan to cede the islands to Mauritius as one of “great stupidity”.

His criticism came just one day after Sir Keir called for calm amid increasingly tense relationships between Nato allies and the US over the president’s threats to Greenland.

Following Mr Trump’s comments, chief secretary to the prime minister, Darren Jones, insisted Sir Keir’s approach to Mr Trump was yielding results, but admitted: “It's not normal for geopolitical discussions to be handled in this way.”

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“The prime minister has shown that private, proper British diplomacy can work,” he told the Today programme, referencing US-UK trade deals.

“It's noisy. I understand that. It's challenging. It's not normal for geopolitical discussions to be handled in this way. But British diplomacy is working.”

It comes after the US president launched a scathing attack on the move as he ramped up his rhetoric on acquiring the Arctic territory of Greenland.

Lashing out in an online rant, the US president wrote: “Shockingly, our “brilliant” NATO Ally, the United Kingdom, is currently planning to give away the Island of Diego Garcia, the site of a vital U.S. Military Base, to Mauritius, and to do so FOR NO REASON WHATSOEVER.”

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He added: “The UK giving away extremely important land is an act of GREAT STUPIDITY, and is another in a very long line of National Security reasons why Greenland has to be acquired. Denmark and its European Allies have to DO THE RIGHT THING.”

The UK government hit back following Trump’s flurry of social media posts, saying the deal had already been publicly welcomed by the US.

“We acted because the base on Diego Garcia was under threat after court decisions undermined our position and would have prevented it operating as intended in future,” a government spokesperson said.

“It has been publicly welcomed by the US, Australia and all other Five Eyes allies, as well as key international partners including India, Japan and South Korea.”

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Mr Trump told Sir Keir during his visit to the White House in February last year that he was “inclined to go with your country” and that he had “a feeling it’s going to work out very well”.

In another post on Truth Social, Mr Trump shared what appeared to be an AI-generated image of him and his vice president, JD Vance, planting a US flag on a snowy landscape with a signpost that reads ‘Greenland, US territory, est 2026’.

A further post showed a doctored image of the US president meeting European leaders in the White House, with a map that highlighted the US, Canada and Greenland in the colours of the American flag.

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Labour MP Emily Thornberry said the UK must hold its ground amid what she called “presidential trolling”.

The chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee calls this an "example of presidential trolling," telling Radio 4's Today programme that the UK should not take Trump "literally" but must take him "seriously".

Meanwhile, the US president is travelling to Davos, Switzerland, on Tuesday for the World Economic Forum. However, Sir Keir will not travel to the meeting because there are “lots of challenges on his time”, one of his senior ministers has said.

Mr Trump’s plans for a “Board of Peace” to examine issues such as Gaza have also come under scrutiny.

When asked if the British government would join “any body called a board of peace with Putin on it”, Mr Jones told BBC Radio 4: “We would not join anything under any circumstances, no, and it’s right that officials are having those conversations with their counterparts to understand what that might look like. I agree President Putin is not a man of peace and it would be absurd for him to be on a board of peace.”

Asked if as a result of the dispute between Britain and other Western nations with Mr Trump over issues Greenland meant Nato was “dying if not dead”, Jones said: “We are not giving up on Nato.”