Far-right leader Geert Wilders should not be given direct responsibility for the Netherlands’ national defence and security, GroenLinks-PvdA leader Frans Timmermans said in a lecture on Wednesday night.

Speaking in Amsterdam, Timmermans said there were links between the threat presented by Russian leader Vladimir Putin and the rise of radical-right parties in the West, such as the PVV in the Netherlands, the FDI in Italy and Trump in the US. 

“I would not like to put my fate in the hands of Putin’s admirers, either here or elsewhere. Our freedom and our true sovereignty are far too dear to me for that,” Timmermans said.

Putin, Timmermans said, is “a pathfinder, a hero and an example” to far right leaders who to him are “the most useful of useful idiots”. 

He also referred to PVV MP Joeri Pool’s recent statement on the defence budget in which he accused the Dutch government of “continuously provoking the Russian Federation” by giving military support to Ukraine. 

Wilders has also made it clear he wants to end military support to Kyiv. 

Timmermans, whose party came second in the November general elections with 27 seats compared with Wilders’ 37, said trying to form a new coalition with the PVV is asking for problems. 

“If you take both Wilders and the democratic rule of law seriously, you must make sure he doesn’t get the chance to undermine that rule of law from within,” Timmermans said. 

Talks on forming a new government have been halted this week because of the half term holidays.

In the meantime, new lead negotiator Kim Putters has been talking to a wide variety of constitutional experts, historians and economists about the form a new cabinet could take, given the NSC has said it will not be part of a majority coalition with the PVV.