Dutch MPs to call for better EU security service cooperation

Photo: Sisyfus via Wikimedia
Photo: Sisyfus via Wikimedia

MPs will call on the government to press for better cooperation between Europe’s security services during Tuesday’s debate on the Brussels bombing, according to the Volkskrant.

Justice minister Ard van der Steur, the paper says, will be given a rough ride by MPs during the debate. In particular, MPs want more information about last week’s revelations that one of the Brussels bombers had been sent to the Netherlands by Turkey.

Van der Steur told MPs last week that Turkey had informed the Netherlands digitally that Ibrahim El Bakraoui was on a plane to Schiphol but did not alert the Dutch police. Opposition MPs have submitted 166 follow up questions, the Volkskrant says.

MPs also want to know how the Netherlands, in its current role as EU president, plans to improve the exchange of information between security services.

‘We have to conclude that cooperation between European security services is failing on many fronts,’ Socialist Party leader Emile Roemer told the paper.

In addition, opposition MPs and the ruling VVD are expected to demand the government beefs up investment in the police.

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