Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende (left), and Labour Party leader Wouter Bos. Bos was Vice-Premier and Finance Minister in Balkenende's coalition government. Balkenende said "where there is no trust, it is difficult to work together".
THE Dutch coalition government collapsed on February 20 over irreconcilable differences on whether to extend the Netherlands’ military mission in Afghanistan. Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende headed the Christian Democratic Alliance (CDA). Members of its partner, the Labour Party (PvdA), resigned from the Cabinet, ending the Centre-Left coalition. It insisted that the four-year-old military mission must end this year as planned and that the country should not accede to the request of NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organisation) to extend it to August next year. The Labour leader Wouter Bos was Vice-Premier and Finance Minister. The smaller Christian Union (C.U.) was also a member of the coalition.
Balkenende rightly said “where there is no trust, it is difficult to work together”. The distrust stems from major differences on cooperation with America’s ventures, be they in Afghanistan or Iraq. “Opinion polls suggest that the Afghan war is deeply unpopular,” Arthur Max of the Associated Press reported. So, indeed, was Dutch participation in the Iraq war. The immediate crisis will pass; but the episode is significant for two reasons. One is that it reflects Europe’s disquiet over the United States’ policies. The dividend expected after the departure of the detested George W. Bush has not materialised, not least because Barack Obama has not fulfilled the expectations he had aroused. The other is of direct relevance to India. It is the publication on January 12, 2010, of the report of an independent Committee of Inquiry on the Netherlands’ policy to extend political support for the U.S’ invasion of Iraq, but no further military support to the imminent U.S.-British invasion of Iraq. -->-->-->
Bush team should talk
Leaders who persuade their nations to go to war have a special obligation to the historical record, so top figures in the Bush administration should cooperate with a British inquiry into the runup to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Former Prime Minister Tony Blair and current Prime Minister Gordon Brown, along with many other British officials from that time, have given riveting public testimony. But former Bush administration officials, who have also been invited to speak to the panel, have yet to participate. Their reluctance is a mistake. -->-->-->
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