Nieuws van de afdeling

7 August 2013

Cold War is still not over

Today and next Friday will see the commemoration, for the eighty-first time, of the only use of nuclear weapons of mass destruction; against an urban population by the United States Air Force, on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. As a result of the bombings an estimate of nearly 200,000 civilians died in the following four months. The commemoration is still necessary in view of the fact that the Cold War, as far as nuclear terror is concerned, has never ended.

2 August 2013

Van Raak: 'Does the NSA contribute to financing the Dutch secret service?’

SP Member of Parliament Ronald van Raak wants to know if the controversial US secret service the National Security Administration (NSA) has in recent years donated money to its Dutch counterpart, the AIVD. His concern comes in reaction to reports that the NSA has paid €114 ($150m/£100m million) to Britain’s secret service body GCHQ.

28 July 2013

Pitiable really, these EU officials

European Union officials live in a protected environment of luxury, but their heads are dropping. A sad situation from which we must deliver them.

26 July 2013

SP: European Commission must look to new ways of financing small firms

For many years banks have been reluctant to extend credit to small businesses. In part because of this, new players have recently entered the market, such as, in the Netherlands, credit unions and the newly-established microfinance organisation Qredits. SP Euro-MP Dennis De Jong, commenting on the problem, says that ‘the European Commission still works primarily via traditional banks. For other players all sorts of barriers have been erected. I’ve now asked the Commission to ensure that these new initiatives, which are more in tune with the small business owner, are given a fair chance.’

25 July 2013

Strong evidence of nuclear weapons on Dutch soil

In a recent article on the modernisation of the American B61 nuclear weapons allocated to NATO, three former government ministers - Lubbers, van Agt and Stemerdink - were quoted as saying that in their period in government nuclear bombs were indeed housed at the Volkel airforce base. The big question now is whether that is still the case, the policy of every successive sitting government being neither to deny nor confirm the presence of these weapons. There are, however, a few hard facts which indicate that they are there.

24 July 2013

Airline passengers still need to be careful: rights remain limited

Every year during the summer holiday period complaints pour into consumer organisations from airline passengers who have experienced problems. The European Consumer Organisation (BEUC) draws attention to two things which stand out amongst these complaints: it is common for the total costs of an airline journey to turn out far higher than expected, because airlines persist in not including all costs in the price shown on the ticket; and European Union laws to protect passengers don’t apply to flights from outside the European Union on a non-European airline. Commenting on these issues, SP Euro-MP Dennis de Jong says that ‘both matters are things that I’ve often taken up with the European Commission, but in their latest legislative proposal I still can’t find any amendment to the regulation. Given the number of complaints, however, these are real problems and I intend shortly to present some proposed amendments to ensure that protection is improved.’

International