Mink row forces Danish PM Mette Frederiksen to call early general election

15 million mink were slaughtered during the pandemic

Mette Frederiksen called for a general election to be held 1 November (Ritzau Scanpix/AFP via Getty Ima)

Denmark’s prime minister has called a general election just seven months before the end of her term in office.

The premiership of Mette Frederiksen, who has headed the Danish minority government since June 2019, has faced growing opposition ever since she took the decision to cull millions of healthy mink at the height of the coronavirus pandemic in order to protect humans from a mutation of the virus.

According to most recent polling, Frederiksen’s centre-left Social Democratic Party is level-pegging with the centre-right opposition, which includes parties that want to squeeze immigration laws.