Three coalition parties decline to sign Ukraine declaration

Photo: DutchNews.nl

Three coalition parties have declined to sign a declaration of solidarity for Ukraine on the third anniversary of the Russian invasion.

Opposition party GroenLinks-PvdA promoted the pamphlet on social media with the title “We stand with Ukraine”, supported by eight other parties including the ruling VVD.

But Geert Wilders’s far-right PVV, the farmers’ party BBB and Nieuw Sociaal Contract, the centre-right party founded by Pieter Omtzigt, were missing from the signatories.

The left-wing Soclalist party (SP) and the pro-Russian Forum voor Democratie (FVD) also declined to sign.

GL-PvdA said it had emailed all the parliamentary party groups to ask if they supported the pamphlet, but received no reply from PVV and BBB.

NSC later issued a statement saying Omtzigt had asked for a “number of small changes” to be made to the text.

It said it objected to a line saying that Europe was having to take charge of its own security, which implied the US was removing its nuclear guarantees.

“We are certainly anticipating a significant withdrawal, but we still see the US as a Nato ally, we see that they are keeping troops on the European continent, as they confirmed to Poland yesterday, and we rely on the security guarantees (nuclear umbrella),” NSC said.

NSC and BBB later posted their own messages on social media site X, better known as Twitter, while Wilders called for a swift peace deal to end “the illegal Russian invasion”.

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