Asylum seekers and refugees in Netherlands
Recent stories
Row over Hirsi Ali splits VVD
Hirsi Ali lied in her 1992 asylum application, according to a TV documentary broadcast on the Vara tv network in May.
21 June 2006 (224 words)
Mass deportation plan causes furore
The government plan to deport 26,000 failed asylum seekers has led to an intense public and parliamentary debate about immigration and asylum in the Netherlands.
25 June 2004 (521 words)
Bulgaria and Romania agree to confiscate deportees' passports
The Dutch government has reached an agreement with the governments of Bulgaria and Romania whereby those nationals who are found guilty of criminal offences and are subsequently deported from the Netherlands will have their passports confiscated for two years.
14 November 2002 (79 words)
The rise and fall of the List Pim Fortuyn
Less than one hundred days after coming to power, an internecine struggle in the party of the murdered anti-immigration politician, Pim Fortuyn, triggered the collapse of the Dutch centre-Right coalition government led by the Christian Democrats.
1 October 2002 (467 words)
Crime increasingly blamed on foreigners
Dick Houtzager, a lawyer for the National Bureau against Racial Discrimination in Rotterdam, believes that the government's harsh asylum approach and fixation with 'immigrant' crime is leading to a situation where 'all hidden biases and prejudices are starting to come out in a very unsubtle way'.
17 August 2002 (662 words)
Northern Iraq refuses deported Kurds
The Dutch policy of returning Iraqi asylum seekers was undermined when the Kurdish authorities of northern Iraq refused to take back asylum seekers from central Iraq, because it would undermine regional security.
24 April 2002 (165 words)
No right to stay for Downs Syndrome Moroccan child
A special school in Leiden is supporting a Moroccan pupil under threat of deportation.
1 October 2001 (95 words)
Asylum prison complex extended
Following tensions with 'regular prisoners' at the prison in Heerhugowaard, 60 refugees whose identity could not be verified, were temporarily being held in the peninsula prison at De Krententuin.
1 October 2001 (139 words)
Harsher policy towards unaccompanied asylum seekers
The justice secretary Kalsbeek has indicated a tough new approach to unaccompanied young asylum seekers including the refusal to provide residence permits to children younger than 15 who give false information about their flight.
1 October 2001 (69 words)
Deportation of family challenged
Some members of the Karpovich family from Belarus were forcibly deported in January despite having lived in the Netherlands for seven years.
1 October 2001 (92 words)
More charter flights
As the government tightens up its deportation policy, it has shown itself willing to hire charter flights to carry out group deportations.
1 October 2001 (65 words)
Iraqi Kurds suffer deportation risk
Campaigners believe that the government's assessment of northern Iraq as safe will pave the way for deportations of Iraqi Kurds.
1 October 2001 (236 words)
Ombudsman condemns conditions at application centres
Following a special investigation, the national ombudsman has produced a report that damns conditions in the Netherlands' four application centres and speaks of a 'serious humanitarian problem'.
1 October 2001 (356 words)
Update on Kollum
Public pressure on murder investigation condemned
1 October 2001 (426 words)
Government reviews Linking Law
The six ministries which are involved in enforcing the Linking Law have ordered a large-scale evaluation of the law and its proper enforcement.
1 October 2001 (147 words)
Legal reception support could break down
A growing number of immigration lawyers are abandoning their clients, fed up with mounting stress, low fees and the lack of social appreciation of the work.
1 October 2001 (54 words)
More suicide attempts among rejected asylum seekers
The Hague-based refugee organisation Prime says that every year around 1,000 asylum seekers attempt suicide, while around 100 asylum seekers actually took their lives after being told that they must leave the country.
1 October 2001 (66 words)
Protests in detention
Tamil hunger strike
1 January 2001 (146 words)
After Dover, police crack down on traffickers
The case of 58 Chinese stowaways who were found dead at Dover has implicated the Dutch police and other institutions which have been accused of institutional negligence in tracking down traffickers.
1 January 2001 (372 words)
Supervision of young asylum seekers questioned after killing
After staying at an AZC for one month, young unaccompanied asylum seekers are transferred to a special house in a residential area accommodating two to three young people.
1 January 2001 (242 words)
Related links
None