Conservative and liberal United States Supreme Court justices have signalled scepticism towards US President Donald Trump’s bid to fire US Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook in a case with the central bank’s independence at stake.

During about two hours of arguments in the case on Wednesday, the justices indicated they were unlikely to grant the Trump administration’s request to lift a judge’s decision barring ​the Republican president from immediately firing Cook while her legal challenge continues to play out.

Some of the justices pressed D John Sauer, the US solicitor general arguing for Trump’s administration, about why Cook was not given a chance to formally respond to the unproven mortgage fraud allegations – which she has denied – that the president cited as justification for ousting Cook.

They also raised concerns about the effect on the economy of such a first-ever presidential firing from the central bank and the implications for the Fed’s cherished independence from political influence.

The case represents the latest dispute to come to the top US judicial body involving Trump’s expansive view of presidential powers since he returned to office 12 months ago.

When the court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, agreed in October to hear the case, it left Cook in her job for the time being.

“This case is about whether the Federal Reserve will set key interest rates guided by evidence and independent judgment or will succumb to political pressure,” Cook, who attended the arguments, said in a statement afterward.

“For as long as I serve at the Federal Reserve, I will uphold the principle of political independence in service to the American people,” Cook added.

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell also sat through the nearly two hours of arguments in the packed courtroom.

‘Cause for removal’

Sauer told the justices that the allegations against Cook impugn her “conduct, fitness, ability or competence to serve as a governor of the Federal Reserve”.

“The American people should not have their interest rates determined by someone who was, at best, grossly negligent in obtaining favourable interest rates for herself,” Sauer said.

“Deceit or gross negligence by a financial regulator in financial transactions is cause for removal,” Sauer added, arguing that the allegations require immediate removal.

Cook has called the allegations against her a pretext to fire her over monetary policy differences as Trump heaps pressure on the central bank to cut interest rates and lashes out at Fed Chair Powell for not doing so more quickly.

Conservative Chief Justice John Roberts asked Sauer to explain whether his argument that Cook should be immediately removed applies if the basis of the mortgage allegations – that she cited two different properties as a principal residence – is an “inadvertent mistake contradicted by other documents in the record”.

Sauer responded that, even if Cook made a mistake on mortgage paper, “it is quite a big mistake”.

Roberts seemed sceptical, telling Sauer, “We can debate that.”

Paul Clement, the lawyer arguing for Cook, told the justices that the allegations against her arise from “at most an inadvertent mistake” on a mortgage application concerning a vacation property.

Trump’s move against Cook is seen as the most consequential challenge to the Fed’s independence since it was formed in 1913. Until now, no president had sought to oust a Fed official.

A Supreme Court ruling is expected by the end of June.

Pressure on Fed independence

Conservative Justice Samuel Alito expressed concern that the administration had handled the case “in a very cursory manner”. Though the case involves Trump’s asserted cause to fire Cook, Alito said, “No court has ever explored those facts. Are the mortgage applications even in the record in this case?”

“There’s a million hard questions in this case,” Alito said.

In creating the Fed, Congress passed a law called the Federal Reserve Act that included provisions meant to insulate the central bank from political interference, requiring governors to be removed by a president only “for cause,” though the law does not define the term nor establish procedures for removal.

Clement told the justices that Trump’s position would transform tenure protections for Fed governors into “at-will employment”.

“That makes no sense,” Clement said. “There’s no rational reason to go through all the trouble of creating this unique, quasi-private entity that is exempt from everything from the [congressional] appropriations process to the civil service laws, just to give it a removal restriction that is as toothless as the president imagines.”

Roberts expressed doubts about Sauer’s arguments that the president’s assertion of a cause is not reviewable, or that judges cannot reinstate a fired officer.

Conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh expressed doubts about the real-world effects of the administration’s arguments.

“Your position,” Kavanaugh told Sauer, “that there’s no judicial review, no process required, no remedy available, very low bar for cause that the president alone determines – I mean, that would weaken, if not shatter, the independence of the Federal Reserve.”

Conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett also questioned why the Trump administration has denied Cook a hearing to defend herself, saying that it “would not have been that big of a deal” for Trump to sit down with Cook and lay out the alleged evidence against her.

Barrett also asked Sauer about the practical implications of allowing Trump’s firing of a Fed governor.

“We have amicus [friend-of-the-court] briefs from economists who tell us that if Governor Cook is [fired], that would trigger a recession. How should we think about the public interest in a case like this?” Barrett asked, adding: “If there is a risk [at this preliminary stage of the case], doesn’t that counsel caution on our part?”

Sauer said that Cook was notified in August of her termination, and that has not affected the markets. Sauer urged the justices to weigh the predictions of doom for the US economy by economists in briefs submitted in the case supportive of Cook with a “jaundiced eye”.

US District Judge Jia Cobb in September ruled that Trump’s attempt to remove Cook without notice or a hearing likely violated her right to due process under the US Constitution’s Fifth Amendment. Cobb also found that the mortgage fraud allegations likely were not a legally sufficient cause to remove a Fed governor under the law, noting that the alleged conduct occurred before she served in the Fed post.

The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit declined Trump’s request to put Cobb’s order on hold.

‘You’re fired’

Conservative and liberal justices alike posed sharp questions to Sauer on his contention that Cook was not entitled to formal notice and a hearing before removal by the president.

Conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch asked Sauer what such a hearing would look like and whether Cook would have a right to legal counsel.

Sauer responded that the court in the past has been very reluctant to “dictate procedures to the president” and that it would be up to Trump to decide.

“Calling Ms. Cook into the [White House] Roosevelt Room, sitting across a conference table, listening for, I don’t know how long, how much evidence is a lawyer required, and then making a decision? Could that suffice?” Gorsuch asked, adding: “Just a meeting across a conference table finished with, ‘You’re fired’?”

Conservative Justice Clarence Thomas asked Sauer on what basis the justices should conclude that the Fed is “an executive branch agency and hence that the president does have a removal authority”.

“There’s an academic dispute about whether or not the Federal Reserve’s Open Market operations constitute executive power or something else, essentially private conduct. However, Congress has over the years kind of packed on traditional executive powers on the Federal Reserve,” Sauer replied.

As a Fed governor, Cook helps set US monetary policy with the rest of the central bank’s seven-member board and the heads of the 12 regional Fed banks. Her term in the job runs to 2038. Cook was appointed in 2022 by Democratic former US President Joe Biden and is the first Black woman to serve in the post.

Liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson pressed Sauer to reconcile two seemingly conflicting positions: his claim that the president has broad discretion to remove a Fed governor, and his recognition that Congress included tenure protections for Fed governors to shield the Fed’s independence from White House interference.

“How does that further the aims of the statute?” Jackson asked.

Alito voiced scepticism toward Clement’s argument that a Fed governor’s conduct before taking office cannot provide a basis for removal by the president, asking Cook’s attorney to address a series of increasingly egregious hypothetical scenarios.

“How about if, after the person assumes office, videos are disclosed in which the office holder is expressing deep admiration for Hitler or for the Klan?” Alito asked.

The president sought to fire Cook on August 25 by posting a termination letter on social media citing the mortgage fraud allegations disclosed by Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte, a Trump appointee.

The administration ‍this month opened a criminal investigation into Powell over remarks he made to Congress last year about a Fed building project, a move he similarly called a pretext aimed at gaining influence over monetary policy.

The life of Uganda’s veteran opposition figure Kizza Besigye is in danger, his wife has said after visiting him in prison.

”He is extremely weak,” said Winnie Byanyima in a statement posted on X. The 69-year-old politician had been taken overnight to a medical facility, the People’s Front for Freedom (PFF) party said, without specifying what he was suffering from.

A prison service spokesperson denied that Besigye’s health was dire, describing his visit to a doctor as a “general check-up”.

Besigye, a former personal doctor to President Yoweri Museveni and one of his longest-standing political rivals, has been in detention since November 2024.

”Dr Besigye told me he is finding it difficult to walk and is experiencing significant pain in his legs,” said Byanyima, a respected human rights advocate and head of UNAids. She said he had an infection that was worsening without giving further details.

Byanyima described how she had found him “huddled” on a dirty plastic chair in a small room near his cell, where he has been returned after getting medical treatment overnight.

Besigye, who has run for president against Museveni four times, has been in detention with his associate Obeid Lutale since they were both dramatically seized in Kenya and taken back to Uganda.

The PFF leader has been charged in a military court with treason, which carries the death sentence, as well as illegal possession of a firearm and threatening national security. He denies the accusations.

Last month, a court denied them bail for the fourth time, saying it was too early to release them as they had not yet entered their pleas.

In a statement on Tuesday, the PFF accused Ugandan authorities of denying Besigye proper medical care, noting that his continued detention amounted to a violation of his basic rights.

“It is a tragedy that a man who has dedicated his life to the health and freedom of others is being denied his own right to medical dignity,” the PFF said, adding: “We hold the regime and the prison authorities fully accountable for his well-being.”

The prison service spokesperson, denied that Besigye’s health was critical, saying the opposition figure was under standard medical supervision.

“Kizza Besigye receives necessary treatment like other prisoners and he is fine,” Baine said, adding: “This morning he was doing his exercises.”

Byanyima described this statement as “a cover-up”.

”Last night, after a sharp deterioration in his condition, he was rushed to the clinic of his personal doctor, where he was treated and then returned to prison late at night,” she said, calling on the authorities to transfer him to a fully equipped hospital.

Another opposition leader, Bobi Wine, has expressed concern over Besigye’s health while in detention, saying his condition appears to be deteriorating amid limited access to medical care.

“We stand fully in solidarity with him and pray for his recovery,” Wine said in a post on X.

This is not the first time the veteran opposition leader has been taken ill at Luzira Prison, a maximum security jail in Kampala, where he has been held.

Last February, Besigye was also reported critically ill after he went on hunger strike demanding justice.

Besigye, who last contested the presidency in 2016, has previously accused the authorities of political persecution.

In recent years he has been less active in politics and did not contest the general election earlier this month.

There have been increasing calls by his family, opposition and human rights groups for him to be released on medical grounds.

President Museveni has blamed Besigye and his legal team for the delays in the trial, which he said had resulted in the PFF’s leader’s continued detention.

Museveni, who has held power since 1986, was on Saturday declared the winner of last week’s presidential election with 72% of the vote.

His closest challenger Wine, whose real name is Robert Kyagulanyi, got 25%.

Wine rejected the results as “fake” and has gone into hiding citing threats against his life.

US President Donald Trump is in Davos, Switzerland, to attend the annual gathering of the World Economic Forum (WEF), where the issue of Greenland will be front and centre.

Trump’s long-running fixation on acquiring Greenland, an autonomous territory of NATO member Denmark, has escalated into a transatlantic imbroglio, with threats of sweeping new tariffs and even taking Greenland by military force rattling stock markets.

Speaking at a White House media briefing on Tuesday to mark one year since his second-term inauguration, he said Greenland was “imperative for national and world security”.

He warned the United Kingdom, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and Finland that they will face 10 percent tariffs on all goods from February 1, rising to 25 percent by June, unless they back his proposed takeover of the Danish autonomous territory. It comes as European leaders meeting in Davos warn the dispute risks a trade war and a rupture in the NATO alliance.

Where is Greenland?

Greenland is the world’s largest island, located mostly within the Arctic Circle between the Arctic and Atlantic oceans. Geographically, it is part of North America, lying northeast of Canada and west of Iceland, but politically it is an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark.

Approximately 80 percent of Greenland is covered by the Greenland ice sheet, the second-largest body of ice on Earth. Because the interior is largely uninhabitable, most of Greenland’s population lives along the coastline. The capital city, Nuuk, located on the southwest coast, is Greenland’s largest city, home to about one-third of the island’s roughly 56,000 residents.

Countries in the Arctic Circle

The Arctic Circle is an imaginary line at 66.5 degrees north that includes the North Pole, the northernmost point on Earth.

Eight countries, including Canada, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, Sweden and the United States, have land lying within this region.

Some Arctic countries are closer to each other than many people realise.

Greenland’s closest neighbour is Canada, and at its narrowest point, between the Nares Strait, the two countries are only 26km (16 miles) apart. Canada and Greenland also technically share a land border, having settled a decades-long dispute over Hans Island, a small rock in the strait, by dividing it in half.

Russia and the US are also neighbours, with Alaska and Russia separated by the Bering Strait, which is about 85km (53 miles) at its narrowest point – a distance similar to that between New York City and New Jersey.

In fact, when you count the Diomede Islands located within the Bering Strait, Russia and the United States are less than 4km (2.4 miles) apart. These small, rocky islands consist of Big Diomede, which belongs to Russia and hosts a weather station, and Little Diomede, part of Alaska. The islands are separated by the International Date Line, creating a 21-hour time difference and marking the boundary between North America and Asia.

How big is Greenland?

On some map projections, which enlarge landmasses near the poles, Greenland appears much bigger than it really is.

In reality, the Arctic island covers 2.17 million square kilometres (836,330 square miles), making it roughly three times the size of the US state of Texas, or about the same size as Saudi Arabia, Mexico or the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Arctic shipping routes

Most of the Arctic is divided into exclusive economic zones (EEZ) extending 200 nautical miles (370km) from the territorial waters of states and where they have jurisdiction over natural resources.

According to data from Arctic Ship Traffic Data, the number of ships operating in the Arctic has increased 37 percent between 2013 and 2023, driven by melting ice and expanding economic opportunities in the region.

There are three main shipping routes in the Arctic, connecting the Atlantic and Pacific:

• The Northern Sea Route (NSR)/Northeast Passage runs along the Arctic coast of Russia and could cut maritime travel between East Asia and Western Europe by 10-15 days compared with travelling via the Suez Canal. In Soviet Russia, the route was used for military supplies and extraction of resources in the Arctic. Now Russia uses it to transport liquified natural gas (LNG).
• The Northwest Passage (NWP) crosses Canada’s Arctic Ocean and could cut maritime vessel journeys between East Asia and Europe by 10 days compared with vessels travelling via the Panama Canal.
• The Transpolar Sea Route (TSR) goes from the centre of the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean and is a direct route via the North Pole. While this route avoids the territorial waters of Arctic states, it is rarely used due to the presence of permanent sea ice. Due to melting ice caps, it is predicted that this sea route may be fully open to vessels by the 2050s, potentially even sooner with high-strength icebreakers.
  

What is the military presence in the Arctic?

Greenland has one major permanent US base, the Pituffik Space Base, and several smaller Danish military facilities.

Pituffik Space Base, formerly known as Thule Air Base, is located in the northwest corner of the island. It supports missile warning, missile defence and space surveillance missions and satellite command and control. It is strategically positioned to counter Russian activities in the Arctic.

About 650 personnel are stationed at the base, including US Air Force and Space Force members, as well as Canadian, Danish and Greenlandic civilian contractors. Under a 1951 agreement with Denmark, the US is permitted to establish and maintain military facilities in Greenland as part of mutual defence within the NATO framework.

The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), a US-Canadian joint military organisation, also operates systems from Pituffik in the form of a Ballistic Missile Early Warning System (BMEWS) for the organisation’s space surveillance.

In Alaska, NORAD controls the Clear Space Force Station, equipped with missile warning, defence and space awareness capabilities. The US also implements forward operating locations – temporary military airfields and radar stations – in Alaska, which are used to extend US defence and response.

Denmark manages the defence of Greenland through the Joint Arctic Command (JAC) with its headquarters in the capital, Nuuk. The base’s main tasks are surveillance and search and rescue operations, and the “assertion of sovereignty and military defence of Greenland and the Faroe Islands”, according to Danish Defence.

According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the Northern Sea route is central to Russia’s security posture in the Arctic. Control of the route sits with Rosatom, giving Moscow the ability to restrict foreign military traffic without direct government approval. In the eastern Arctic, access through the Bering Strait has pushed Russia to expand radar coverage, search and rescue capacity and airfields, including the Sopka-2 radar installations on Wrangel Island and Cape Schmidt.

In the central Arctic, Russia has hardened its military footprint. Bastion-P and Pantsir-S1 systems – mobile defence systems – are deployed on Novaya Zemlya and Kotelny Island, extending area-denial across air and sea approaches.

In the western Arctic, the Northern Fleet, which oversees Russia’s second-strike capability, is based in Severomorsk. CSIS says Moscow has also reactivated dozens of Soviet-era facilities, reopening airbases, radar stations and border posts across the region.

Chinese investments in the Arctic

China has emerged as a key player in the Arctic, stating its desire to create a “Polar Silk Road”, similar to the Belt and Road Initiative, where new shipping routes would emerge as ice sheets recede.

According to the Carnegie Endowment, China views the Arctic as a future transport and industrial corridor. A number of Chinese companies also have mining projects in Greenland, including for iron ore, rare earths and uranium. China also has projects focused on Arctic energy via Russia’s LNG sector.

Chinese state-owned firms have stakes in Novatek’s LNG projects and are a major buyer of Arctic gas. The Chinese have also supplied key equipment to Russia’s Arctic LNG projects, especially after Western sanctions on Russia.

What are Greenland’s resources?

Greenland is rich in natural resources, including zinc, lead, gold, iron ore, rare earth elements (REEs), copper and oil.

It is home to some of the world’s largest deposits of rare earths used in high-tech industries. These resources have attracted significant attention, including from President Trump.

Gold pockets exist in areas like Nanortalik and South Greenland. Greenland also has deposits of diamonds in the Maniitsoq region, just north of Nuuk.

Copper deposits are largely unexplored in Greenland, according to the Mineral Resources Authority, with areas in the northeast and central east largely untapped. Iron ore deposits are dotted around West Greenland, while nickel traces have been found around the island’s southwest coast.

Graphite, used mostly in EV batteries and steel-making, is also reported to exist in Greenland, with exploration around Amitsoq. While zinc has been found in the north of Greenland, titanium and vanadium deposits are located in the southwest, east and south of the territory. Tungsten is also found in central east and Northeast Greenland with assessed deposits in the south and west.

A brief history of Greenland

The first Inuit people settled in Greenland in about 2500 BCE.

In the 10th century, Norse explorers arrived in Greenland and established settlements. By 1721, Denmark had made Greenland a colony.

Though a Danish territory, Greenland became self-governing in 1979 after more than two centuries under Danish control. It is one of Denmark’s two autonomous territories, with the Faroe Islands being the other.

In 1941, during World War II, the US and Denmark agreed to allow American forces to defend Greenland. Its strategic location was vital for countering German submarines and securing shipping routes. The US maintained a military presence throughout the Cold War, using Greenland for early-warning radar and monitoring Soviet activity.

In 2009, Greenland gained self-rule over most of its internal affairs, including control over natural resources and governance. However, Denmark still handles foreign policy, defence and funding.