The Dutch government has put forward a law that punishes “public endorsement” for terrorism.
Last weekend the consultation phase of the draft law was closed, and almost 12,000 people and organisations responded to the proposal put forward by caretaker justice minister David van Weel. More than any other proposals this year.
Van Weel has said the law is needed because “terrorist and violent messages” were shown during the Nato summit taking place in The Hague in June.
Protesters chanted, among other things: “No war, no occupation. Stop NATO domination” and showed placards saying “Honour the martyrs. Long live the resistance.”
“I don’t want this anymore,” van Weel told Dutch broadcaster WNL, himself of the centre-right VVD, told WNL, the Dutch broadcaster now run by a former VVD strategist.
Protesters waving flags in support of groups the Dutch government considers terrorist, or approvingly sharing such messages online, could face up to two years in prison. Those glorifying attacks could face up to three.
The WNL journalist asked how long it would take for the law to become official and wished him “good luck.”
Some citizen questions during the consultation were less enthusiastic, however.
One member of the public who preferred to remain anonymous warned that “such a law could also be used by those in power to silence the opposition,” and referred to vaguely worded anti-terrorism laws in Nazi Germany, Vladimir Putin’s Russia and Turkey to make a point.
Others have compared it to the United Kingdom, where the direct-action group Palestine Action was recently banned under anti-terror legislation.
Activists from that group had thrown washable red paint on F-35s in protest against arms deliveries to Israel. Since then, more than 700 demonstrators have been arrested, including hundreds last weekend in London during a protest against the ban.
In another video shared by a Dutch civil servant, a student at the same protest sitting on the ground is arrested for “holding a placard,” as she herself describes it.
The danger, as Dutch judges have pointed out, lies precisely in the vagueness of the text.
In a letter sent on Friday (15 August), the day the consultation closed, the Council for the Judiciary, which acts as liaison between judges and the government, warned that the text does not provide judges with sufficient clarity to determine the boundaries of acceptable behaviour.
Showing a flag, even if it “does not incite, offend, or provoke hatred — can already be interpreted as an expression of support. This is potentially a significant expansion of punishable conduct.”
The letter also cites former VVD justice minister Ivo Opstelten, who in 2014 decided against criminalising glorification: “Criminalising the glorification of terrorism would quickly cover all sorts of expressions… I’m thinking of tasteless, adolescent behaviour on the internet, because that’s what we would also be talking about.”
This, Opstelten said, “affects freedom of expression, which in my view is a great good in our society.”
Finally the judges point out, the law overlaps with other existing laws against incitement to hatred and group defamation that already exist.
In July, peace organisation Pax also criticised the law as “unnecessary and dangerous,” noting that it “creates room for political persecution, encourages discrimination, and undermines space for public debate and solidarity.”
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Wester is a journalist from the Netherlands with a focus on the green economy. He joined EUobserver in September 2021. Previously he was editor-in-chief of Vice, Motherboard, a science-based website, and climate economy journalist for The Correspondent.
Wester is a journalist from the Netherlands with a focus on the green economy. He joined EUobserver in September 2021. Previously he was editor-in-chief of Vice, Motherboard, a science-based website, and climate economy journalist for The Correspondent.