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US President Donald Trump would not “land on Greenland and take it by force”, Lord Mandelson has said.

The former UK ambassador to the US told the BBC he admired Trump’s “directness” in political talks but said he was not a “fool”, and advisers would remind him taking Greenland would “spell real danger” for the US national interest.

There has been growing focus during Trump’s term on how the semi-autonomous Danish territory is run, with Trump on Saturday saying the US needed to “own” Greenland to stop Russia and China from doing so, and would achieve it “the easy way” or “the hard way”.

Denmark and Greenland say the territory is not for sale, with Denmark warning military action would spell the end of the Nato military alliance.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio will hold talks with Denmark about Greenland next week. The AFP news agency reports that a Danish poll suggests that 38% of Danes think the US will launch an invasion of Greenland under the Trump administration.

Speaking on BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme, Lord Mandelson said: “He’s not going to do that [use military action to take Greenland]. I don’t know, but I’m offering my best judgement as somebody who’s observed him at fairly close quarters.”

Sparsely populated, Greenland’s location between North America and the Arctic makes it ideally placed for missile early warning systems and for monitoring vessels in the region.

Trump has repeatedly maintained that Greenland is vital to US national security, claiming without evidence that it was “covered with Russian and Chinese ships all over the place”. His focus on the territory returned after a commando raid on the Venezuelan capital Caracas last week seized president Nicolas Maduro and his wife and killed dozens of people.

Lord Mandelson, who only lasted a few months as ambassador, also said: “We are all going to have to wake up to the reality that the Arctic needs securing against China and Russia. And if you ask me who is going to lead in that effort to secure, we all know, don’t we, that it’s going to be the United States.”

Meanwhile, the UK is working with Nato allies to bolster security in the Arctic, a senior minister told BBC One’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme.

Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said discussions about securing the region against Russia and China were part of Nato’s usual business rather than a response to the US military threat, and then said the UK agreed with Trump that the Arctic Circle is an increasingly contested part of the world.

“It is really important that we do everything that we can with all of our Nato allies to ensure that we have an effective deterrent in that part of the globe against Putin”, she said.

But Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said the situation in Greenland was a “second order” issue in comparison to what is currently happening in Iran, as protesters there defy a government crackdown.

Questions around sending troops to Greenland were “hypothetical” because “the US has not invaded Greenland,” she said.

The US already has significant influence over Greenland. Under existing agreements with Denmark, the US has the power to bring as many troops as it wants to the territory.

But on Saturday, Trump told reporters in Washington that existing agreements were not good enough.

“I love the people of China. I love the people of Russia,” Trump said. “But I don’t want them as a neighbour in Greenland, not going to happen.

“And by the way, Nato’s got to understand that.”

Earlier this week Denmark’s Nato allies – major European countries as well as Canada – have rallied to its support with statements reaffirming that “only Denmark and Greenland can decide on matters concerning their relations”.

A key architect of New Labour, Lord Mandelson has been in and out of British politics for four decades.

He held a number of ministerial roles from the election of Tony Blair – and had to resign from post twice – until Labour lost power in 2010.

Lord Mandelson has said he never saw girls at Jeffrey Epstein’s properties, and declined to apologise to the late paedophile’s victims for maintaining his friendship with the American because he was not “knowledgeable of what he was doing”.

In his first interview since being sacked as the UK’s ambassador to the US over his links to Epstein, he told the BBC he thought he had been “kept separate” from the sexual side of the late financier’s life because he was gay.

He was fired after emails emerged showing supportive messages he had sent to Epstein after the American was convicted for soliciting prostitution from a minor.

The former ambassador said the only people he had seen at Epstein’s properties were “middle-aged housekeepers”.

He said he would have apologised were he “in any way complicit or culpable” but stressed that was never the case.

Epstein, a well-connected financier, died in a New York prison cell in 2019 awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. He had previously been convicted in 2008 of soliciting prostitution from a minor, for which he was registered as a sex offender.

Asked on BBC’s One’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg whether he would like to apologise to Epstein’s victims for continuing the friendship after that first conviction, he said:

“I want to apologise to those women for a system that refused to hear their voices and did not give them the protection they were entitled to expect”.

“That system gave him protection and not them.

“If I had known, if I was in any way complicit or culpable, of course I would apologise for it. But I was not culpable, I was not knowledgeable of what he was doing.”

He continued: “I regret and will regret to my dying day the fact that powerless women, women who were denied a voice, were not given the protection they were entitled to expect.”

Lord Mandelson, whose tenure as ambassador lasted just a few months, was also asked in the interview about his views on US President Donald Trump’s ongoing comments about his country needing to “own” Greenland.

While saying that he admired Trump’s “directness” in his political dealings, he said he did not believe the US president would “land on Greenland and take it by force”.

He added: “He’s not going to do that. I don’t know, but I’m offering my best judgement as somebody who’s observed him at fairly close quarters. He’s not a fool.”

He said the president had a close circle of advisers around him “reminding him that if he were to intervene, take Greenland, that would be completely counterproductive – and would spell real danger for America’s national interest”.

Asked about his long friendship with Epstein over the decades, Lord Mandelson said he believed he was “kept separate” from Epstein’s sex life because of his own sexuality.

“Possibly some people will think because I am a gay man… I wasn’t attuned to what was going on. I don’t really accept that.

“I think the issue is that because I was a gay man in his circle I was kept separate from what he was doing in the sexual side of his life.”

He referred to one occasion he had spent one or two nights on Epstein’s infamous private island, as well as visits to Epstein’s New York and New Mexico properties.

“The only people that were there were the housekeepers, never were there any young women or girls, or people that he was preying on or engaging with in that sort of ghastly predatory way that we subsequently found out he was doing.”

“Epstein was never there,” he noted of his visits to the island.

The government sacked Lord Mandelson as its ambassador to the US after emails showed he had been in contact with Epstein after his first conviction, offering him support.

Number 10 sources said at the time that he had been “economical with the truth” before he was appointed and they were not aware of the “depth” of their relationship.

On Sunday, Lord Mandelson said the government “knew everything” when giving him the job, “but not the emails because they came as a surprise to me”.

He said he understood why he had been sacked.

“The prime minister found himself in the middle of what must’ve seemed to him to been some kind of thermonuclear explosion – I’ve been there, I know what goes on.

“I wish I’d had the opportunity to remind him of the circumstances of my relationship, my friendship with Jeffrey Epstein and how I came to write the emails in the first place.

“I didn’t, so I understand why he took the decision he did, but one thing I’m very clear about is that I’m not going to seek to reopen or relitigate this issue. I’m moving on.”

In response, Downing Street said the emails showed the “depth and extent” of the relationship was “materially different” to what they had known when appointing Lord Mandelson, particularly his “suggestion that Jeffrey Epstein’s first conviction was wrongful and should be challenged was new information”.

“In light of that, and mindful of the victims of Epstein’s crimes, he was withdrawn as ambassador with immediate effect.”