Amend treaties to take suspect Jihadists' passports: VVD

The VVD wants to consult with other countries to change existing international treaties so that terrorists' can lose their Dutch citizenships, even if this would mean that the terrorist will then not be a citizen of any country ("stateless"), NRC reports.

This was VVD Parliament Member Ard van der Steur's proposal in the Tweede Kamer (lower house of parliament) today. The suggestion came during a debate on Minister Ivo Opstelten's (Security and Justice) proposal to also withdraw Dutch citizenship from people guilty of preparing for terrorist acts.

At this time Dutch citizenship can already be withdrawn for various reasons, including for terrorist activities, but this can only be done if the person in question also has a passport for another country. Van der Steur's suggestion for statelessness received interest from the CDA and SGP.

Minister Opstelten's proposal to withdraw citizenship from those preparing for terrorist acts can count on support from the VVD, PvdA, CDA and SGP, the newspaper reports. The SP, D66, GroenLinks and ChristenUnie still have some reservations. The PVV thinks his proposal is not going far enough.