A TUI Dreamliner scheduled to fly from Aruba to the Netherlands on Monday was kept on the ground due to a bomb threat. A Dutch woman was arrested, TUI Nederland confirmed to the Telegraaf.
"The plane was checked completely and all passengers and baggage were taken off board for an extra security check. It turned out to be a false alarm. Nothing was found", a TUI spokesperson said to the newspaper. The plane took off a few hours later.
A legislative proposal by PVV parliamentarians Sietse Fritsma and Machiel de Graaf to send criminal Antilleans back to Aruba, Curacao or Sint Maarten got no support from other parties in parliament. "This is not possible and we should also not want this", CDA parliamentarian Madeleine van Toorenburg said in a debate in the Tweede Kamer, the lower house of Dutch parliament, NOS reports.
Aruba, Curacao and Bonaire are dealing with many asylum seekers from Venezuela due to a humanitarian and political crisis in the country. The three islands, which form part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, are getting too little support from the Netherlands in sheltering these asylum seekers, Aruban Prime Minister Evelyn Wever-Croes said to NRC.
She called the Netherlands' attitude "too indifferent and irritating". Aruba is located less than 40 kilometers fro the Venezuelan coast. Around 5 thousand Venezuelans have already fled to the island.
John Christopher Ludwick, who claimed that he helped Joran van der Sloot dispose of missing teen Natalee Holloway's body, was stabbed to death on Tuesday as he tried to abduct a woman in Port Charlotte, Florida, CBS News reports.
The population of Curaçao was forced to begin stockpiling food since neighboring country Venezuela announced a trade boycott with the Dutch Caribbean island on Friday. The trade ban also covered Aruba and Bonaire, all three of which rely heavily on the South American country's fruits and vegetables.
The European Union published its black list of tax havens. It consists of 17 countries the EU believes help multinationals and rich people avoid the tax authorities. The Netherlands does not appear on the list - no EU countries do. But Aruba and Curacao, which form part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, were placed on a "gray list" - they have two years to implement promised improvements, or they'll be blacklisted, the Volkskrant reports.
The family of an Aruban man who died during an arrest while he was on vacation in the Netherlands wants the European Court of Justice to determine if the investigation into the arrest was handled properly. The family of Mitch Henriquez also want expert testimony from a lip reader to help interpret new camera footage from the day of the arrest they say shows one officer picking up Henriquez's lifeless body, when another pushes the body back to the ground. They also say the video shows that Henriquez's face was purple from a lack of oxygen.
Joran van der Sloot and friend John Ludwick ground missing American teen Natalee Holloway's bones to dust and burned her skull in a cave on Aruba, Ludwick confesses in the fifth episode of a documentary on Holloway's disappearance, RTL Nieuws reports.
A four year, $200 million plan to increase capacity at the Queen Beatrix International Airport in Aruba was given the go-ahead by the Aruba Airport Authority. The airport will work with US authorities to improve passenger preclearance through the American border checks in the Aruba airport, while also making the facility more sustainable in the process.
The Aruba Airport Authority awarded the design and development contract to NACO, the company said in a statement. The Den Haag firm is a subsidiary of Dutch engineering group Royal HaskoningDHV.
The number of adults held in custody by order of Dutch courts fell in 2015 by 3,450 to 39,790. It represents a decline of nearly eight percent on the 2014 prison population, according to Statistics Netherlands (CBS), a reversal after two straight years of slight increases.
Joran van der Sloot confessed to killing Natalee Holloway in a video recorded with hidden cameras by American news sites Radar Online and The National Enquirer
Arkefly will not be allowed to make flights between Eindhoven and Aruba and Curacao. The government wants flights with increased risk of drug smuggling to only go through airports with adequate control facilities. At this stage only Schiphol Airport has ample facilities for such flights.
The municipality of Eindhoven is concerned that airline Arke's plan to fly from the city to Aruba and Curacao will result in large amounts of drugs being trafficked through Eindhoven Airport. Arke wants to make two weekly flights from Eindhoven to the two islands from November.
Mitch Henriquez was laid to rest in Aruba on Thursday. Some 250 people attended the service at the Santa Ana church on the island. Some attendees wore T-shirts reading "Justice for Mitch".
Mitch Henriquez' body is returning to Aruba. The plane carrying his remains left the Netherlands on Tuesday afternoon.
The mood in Schilderswijk, The Hague was still unsettled on Tuesday night. Young people lit fires in several places. This time the police was ready for the riots. The riot police performed various charges, some to protect firefighters who were extinguishing the fires. A police helicopter circled above the area.
The Electorale Volksbeweging, the opposition party in Aruba, has written a letter to the Dutch government in which they demand a "thorough investigation" into the death of 42 year old Aruban Mitch Henriquez after he was arrested at a festival in The Hague on Saturday.
The Criminal Investigation team seized nearly 4 million euros in a large investigation into money laundering last week. Several suspects were arrested in Aruba and the Netherlands.
The Public Prosecutor in Aruba will not search underneath the Mariott Hotel for Natalee Holloway's remains, chief officer of Justice Eric Olthof told Dutch newspaper AD. According to him, investigation has shown that the information from Jurrien de Jong, a self proclaimed eyewitness, can not be correct.
Joran van der Sloot is dismissing Jurriën de Jong's account that missing American teenager Natalee Holloway is buried beneath a crawl space at the Mariott Hotel in Aruba.
On Saturday the Netherlands and Aruba reached an agreement that aims at achieving a sustainable balanced budget for the island, the Dutch government announced on Monday. This agreement should put an end to the long ongoing discussion and conflict surrounding the island's budget.
King Willem-Alexander, Queen Maxima and Prime Minister Mark Rutte attended the National Remembrance on the Dam in Amsterdam on Monday night. Prime Minister Rutte gave a speech entitled "Passing memories" after the memorial service in the Nieuwe Kerk.
King Willem-Alexander, Queen Maxima and Prime Minister Mark Rutte will attend the National Remembrance in Amsterdam on Monday, May 4th. Prime Minister Rutte will also be present at the Liberation Day festival in Vlissingen on Tuesday, May 5th. There he will light the liberation fire as the start of the National Celebration of Liberation, which happens once every 5 years.
Dave Holloway, Natalee Holloway's father, has called on the Public Prosecutor to investigate the tip that his daughter is buried under the Marriott hotel in Aruba, the AD reports.
