Dutch news in brief, 3 November 2005

Maxima to make official visit to Argentina

Argentine-born Princess Maxima of the Netherlands is to make a working visit to her homeland from 1 to 7 December, the Dutch government’s information service (RVD) said on Thursday. Before arriving in Argentina, Maxima will visit Brazil, starting on 28 November. She is visiting both countries as part of the group of advisers for the International Year of Microcredit. She is to give a speech about microcredit in the city of her birth Buenos Aires. Maxima was working for Germany’s Deutsche Bank in New York when she met her future husband, Crown Prince Willem-Alexander.

Verdonk’s office window damaged

Immigration and Integration Minister Rita Verdonk has called in the police to investigate damage to the window of her personal office in The Hague. The national forensic agency (NFI) is trying to establish whether the damage was caused by a projectile. The authorities have declined to say what type of damage was caused and how long the investigation is expected to take.

Parliament shocked by gangland murders

MPs in the Dutch Parliament voiced unease on Thursday about the recent increase in murders related to the Amsterdam underworld. The parliamentary faction of the ruling Christian Democrats (CDA) teamed up with the opposition Labour Party (PvdA) to ask the government to clarify whether the police in the capital had sufficient resources to deal with underworld violence. MPs have been spurred into action by the three gangland assassinations this week. Two murders were carried out in Amsterdam and infamous Amsterdam gangster John Mieremet was shot dead in Thailand. Only about three out of more than 20 underworld “hits” since 1991 have been solved by the police.

Air marshals are here to stay

Air marshals are to become a regular feature on KLM and Martinair flights. The Dutch cabinet took the decision after a trial scheme was judged to be a success. Armed military police officers, dressed in civilian clothes, are trained to deal with terrorist situations on board planes. They will probably be used mainly on flights to the US but the Dutch government will not say how often the air marshals will be deployed.

Inspectors visit illegal hotels

City council officials have detected 10 illegal hotels operating in the centre of Amsterdam. The proprietors have been ordered to close down or face a fine, a spokesperson for the city council said on Thursday. A total of 33 addresses were checked and 14 turned out to be legal but are to remain under observation. The illegal hotels had already shut down in four other cases and there was no one home at another five premises. They will be visited again. The inspections were carried out following complaints of unfair competition and lack of safety and quality controls. None of the illegal hotels were found to be a fire hazard.

Subject: Dutch news