Even though reports that Saudi Arabia is considering a trade boycott of the Netherlands are still based on rumour, Dutch diplomats are working flat out to prevent it happening, the Volkskrant reports on Thursday.

The paper says officials in The Hague and Riyad are working overtime to head off the threat and that prime minister Mark Rutte has warned ‘many jobs’ are at stake.

The potential boycott stems from a sticker which anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders placed on the door of his parliamentary office. It reads, in Arabic, ‘Islam is a lie, Mohammed is a criminal, the Koran is poison.’ The sticker is a deliberate take-off of the Saudi Arabian flag.

Sanctions

Earlier this week, Saudi Arabian media reported the Middle Eastern country is now considering taking economic sanctions against the Netherlands.

‘Of course they appreciate the fact that the Dutch government has made its position clear,’ foreign affairs minister Frans Timmermans told television show Buitenhof on Sunday. ‘But it would appear that Saudi Arabia is still irritated.’

Timmermans is planning to fly to Riyad shortly to discuss the situation.

Threat

However, it is unclear why reports of a trade boycott have only now surfaced. According to a cabinet source in the Volkskrant, the Saudis understand that the Dutch government has distanced itself from the sticker campaign.

‘But the insult is too great for them to ignore it,’ the source said. They may also be angry that deputy prime minister Lodewijk Asscher described the idea of sanctions this weekend as ‘an insane threat’. 

There has been no official reaction from the Saudi authorities, the paper points out. However, sources told the Volkskrant officials have been wondering for months what do about the sticker.

Silence

‘In Riyad they think the Dutch government should have shut Wilders up,’ Rob de Wijk from the Centre for Strategic Studies in The Hague told the Volkskrant. The issue revolves around ‘a cultural difference with major impact, particularly if the Saudi government comes under pressure from its people’.

Some 30 Dutch companies such as Shell, dairy group FrieslandCampina and dredging company Boskalis have hundreds of millions of euros invested in Saudi Arabia. Total Dutch exports are in the region of some €2.2bn a year.

According to the Financieele Dagblad, Dutch firms are already beginning to feel the impact and are worried about losing orders.

Construction group Strukton for example is concerned about the likely impact on its role in a consortium to build a new metro system in Riyad. The contract will add €1bn to the company’s turnover, the FD says.