European Commission

When European Commissioner Frans Timmermans was a PvdA parliamentarian in 2010, he did nothing for six months because he had not be given the party's Foreign Affairs portfolio, Home Affairs Minister Ronald Plasterk said in an interview with the Volkskrant. Plasterk was also a parliamentarian at the time.

The so called Gulen-movement "certainly" played a role in a failed coup in Turkey earlier this year, Vice President of the European Commission Frans Timmermans said in an interview with Knack on Tuesday, AD reports.

The Turkish government sees cleric Fethullah Gulen as the mastermind behind the attempted coup in July, but so far has little evidence to prove it. Gulen currently lives in the United States.

Neelie Kroes broke European Union conduct rules by being the director of a company in the Bahamas during her term as European Commissioner and never reporting that position to the Commission, Financieele Dagblad reports based on documents in the hands of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ).

The municipalities of Dutch border cities Bergen op Zoom, Steenbergen and Tholen are submitting a complaint about Belgian nuclear plant Doel to the European Commission. The municipalities are protesting against the Belgian authorities decision to extend the plant's operation without consulting them, despite the fact that the plant holds trans-boundary risks and impact

The European Commission must stop the merge between the London Stock Exchange and Deutsche Borse, the Dutch association of stockholders VEB and other European colleagues demand in a letter sent to the European Commissioner for Competition.

The Netherlands collected 25.7 million euros in back tax from Starbucks, a spokesperson for the European Commission said on Monday. The back tax comes from a so-called sweetheart tax deal between Starbucks and the Dutch Tax Authorities, which the European Commission ruled to be illegal state aid last year

In the coming months the European Commission will negotiate with airlines from Southeast Asia and the Middle East to give them more landing rights in Europe, the European Transport Ministers decided. In return, countries like the United Arab Emirates and Qatar has to stop giving state aid to their airlines

Turkey almost complies to all requirements for visa free travel within the European Union, the European Commission announced on Wednesday. According to EU Commissioner and vice-president Frans Timmermans, the country "has made impressive progress, particularly in recent weeks"

Europe will not be "blackmailed" by Turkey's threat to terminate the asylum agreement with the EU if the visa requirement for Turks is not lifted quickly, European Commissioner Frans Timmermans said to German newspaper De Zeit.

The Dutch government will come with an reaction to the Netherlands "no"-vote in the Ukraine referendum last week, and plans on how to proceed, by September at the latest, Minister Bert Koenders of Foreign Affairs wrote in a letter to Parliament on Tuesday.

The Netherlands voting "no" in the referendum on the association agreement between the EU and Ukraine, has no effect on the agreement itself. The agreement was already signed and unanimously adopted by all EU member states' heads of government, and the Dutch "no" does not change that, a spokesperson for the European Commission said