Ukrainian president Zelenskyy to speak in Tweede Kamer during NATO summit in The Hague

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will address the Tweede Kamer in The Hague on Tuesday during his visit to the Netherlands for the NATO Summit. His appearance follows a formal invitation from the Dutch government, which was backed by a majority of political parties in the Foreign Affairs Committee.

The request to invite Zelenskyy was initiated by Kati Piri of GroenLinks-PvdA and circulated among committee members by email. The parties GroenLinks-PvdA, VVD, NSC, D66, CDA, ChristenUnie, and Volt supported the proposal. BoerBurgerBeweging (BBB) opposed it, and no response was received from the remaining factions. This resulted in a parliamentary majority in favor of inviting the Ukrainian president to speak, according to an official report from the Tweede Kamer Foreign Affairs Committee.

By June 21, the Foreign Affairs Committee had agreed to expand the event into a joint session for members of both the Tweede Kamer and Eerste Kamer, pending Zelenskyy’s availability. That decision was also supported by a majority of parliamentary groups. The chamber chairs of both houses determined that the meeting would be held in the Tweede Kamer due to logistical and security considerations.

Zelenskyy’s role at the summit itself has been the subject of international debate. Despite European allies strongly advocating for his presence, the United States — under the leadership of President Donald Trump — opposed allowing him to attend official meetings. While Ukraine is not a NATO member, several European governments pushed for symbolic recognition of Zelenskyy amid Russia’s ongoing war against his country.

As a result of those efforts, an official NATO-Ukraine Council meeting will take place, but unlike last year’s summit in Washington D.C., it will only include foreign ministers rather than heads of state. That meeting is expected to coincide with a royal dinner hosted by King Willem-Alexander for NATO leaders at Huis ten Bosch on Tuesday evening.

Zelenskyy has been invited to that dinner as well, even though he will not attend the leaders’ formal talks. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte personally extended the invitation to the Ukrainian president earlier this week, sources told ANP. Zelenskyy stated that Ukraine’s participation in the summit “would send the right signal to Russia.”

Caretaker Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof joined other European leaders in pressing for Zelenskyy’s inclusion in the summit program. Schoof reportedly backed the effort to include Zelenskyy in the summit, especially after a weekend in which Ukraine launched a massive drone attack on Russian military installations, destroying aircraft and several bases.

Days earlier, Russia had carried out a large-scale missile attack on Ukrainian cities, drawing rare public criticism from Trump. “I don’t know what the hell happened to Putin,” the president said. “I’ve known him a long time, always gotten along with him, but he’s sending rockets into cities and killing people, and I don’t like it at all.”