Parliament supports arming unmanned military drones

The lower house of the Dutch parliament supports a call from the Commander of the Armed Forces, Onno Eichelsheim, to equip the military's drones with weapons. Eichelsheim told Niewsuur that it was "logical in this phase" to arm the drones, looking "toward the future."

The Netherlands recently acquired four MQ-9 Reaper drones. The first training flight happened from Curacao on Wednesday. The currently-unarmed drones are intended for surveillance over land and sea.

A parliamentary majority of at least coalition parties VVD, CDA, and ChristenUnie, and opposition parties PVV, SGP, and JA21 agree with Eichelsheim.

The Tweede Kamer, the lower house of the Dutch parliament, was previously against arming drones, questioning the ethics of firing missiles from the Netherlands on entirely different parts of the world. But Russia invading Ukraine seems to have changed some minds.

The Cabinet will decide later whether or not to arm the drones.