Dutch politicians want EU anti-fake news watchdog scrapped

The Tweede Kamer, the lower house of Dutch parliament, wants to get rid of the European Commission's task force against spreading fake news, the so-called EUvsDisinfo. This follows the task force naming a number of Dutch news services as spreaders of fake news, Het Parool reports.

The Dutch news services involved are NPO Radio 1, the Gelderlander, GeenStijl and The Post Online. According to the task force, pro-Russian propaganda gained the upper hand in a few reports from these organizations.

The VVD and SP call on the government to advocate disbanding this task force in Brussels. The PVV, GroenLinks and SGP also want the office scrapped. EUvsDisinfo "misses its target" and "meddles with the free press in the Netherlands", VVD parliamentarian Dilan Yesilgoz and her SP colleague Peter Kwint said, according to Het Parool.

Minister Kasja Ollongren of Home Affairs has yet to respond to this demand from the Kamer.