QALA-E-SURKH, Afghanistan — The Dutch infantrymen stood on a ridge near the Baluchi Valley, an area in south-central Afghanistan controlled by the Taliban and tribes opposed to the central government. More >
TNT Post is warning its workers that thousands of jobs are to go and if they don’t accept a reduction in pay and working conditions, thousands more will be at stake. The reason? The company has lost its monopoly on all but the very lightest letters, and that sector too will be up for grabs next year. More >
Prostitution is a fact of life and the fact that some countries, like the Netherlands, choose not to close their eyes to the brothel business is something to be lauded. But things start getting a little tricky when tolerance of a red light district starts nudging towards exploiting it as a major tourist attraction. More >
When you think tall, you probably think America. Tallest buildings. Tallest athletes. Tallest population. But no longer. Today, to find the world’s tallest people, you have to look beyond the windmills, wooden shoes, and wheels of cheese … to tiny Holland. More >
It is a particularly hateful comment on the state of American cinema that one of the most egregious examples of Islamofacism since the unspeakable events of 9-11 has gone virtually unacknowledged by the filmmaking community. More >
Rarely does a filmmaker have a chance to make a ground-breaking film and then, 30 years later, return to the same subject and remake it. More >
PCM, the publisher of daily newspapers de Volkskrant, NRC Handelsblad and Trouw, has sacked board member Philip Alberdingk Thijm. PCM, recently re-acquired by its original owners from UK private equity firm Apax, said said it had lost all confidence in Alberdingk Thijm’s performance. More >
Joop van der Zeeuw isn’t a fan of indoor gardening. The civil servant will evict anyone he finds growing more than five cannabis plants in a Rotterdam apartment. More >
Scientists in the Netherlands are developing a new generation of foods that can help prevent obesity by making people eat less, a research institute said on Thursday More >
Marriages are not made in heaven, especially when it comes to mergers between large international banks. More >
The takeover of ABN Amro by Barclays continues to generate considerable coverage both here and across the English Channel. It cannot have been pure coincidence that the BBC decided Wednesday night was a good moment to broadcast the results of a nine-month undercover operation into life in a Barclay’s call centre. More >
D66 leader Alexander Pechtold certainly seems to have aroused a cross-section of parliamentary hackles for daring to ask if Geert Wilder’s wife still has Hungarian nationality. Wilders and his anti-immigration cohorts in the PVV want to bring an end to dual nationality because, they say, it gives you divided loyalties. More >
