Dutch PM Rutte continues to negotiate on EU-Ukraine treaty adjustment

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte refuses to reject the Ukraine-European Union Association Agreement, despite a firm "no" by the Dutch electorate in April this year, he stated in a letter to the Dutch parliament on Monday.

Instead of rejecting the treaty the Dutch government aims for an adjustment and Rutte continues to negotiate with EU partners in the forthcoming period.

In an advisory referendum on April 6, a vast majority of the Dutch voters rejected the Agreement, a treaty between the EU, their 28 member states and Ukraine on political, economic and a broad range of legislation and regulation topics.

The referendum results provided an opinion and are, according to the Dutch law, not binding, but the outcome forced the government to reconsider the Agreement.

Rutte had agreed with the House of Representatives (De Tweede Kamer) that the government would make known what to do with the outcome of the referendum before Nov. 1.

He had three options: not to ratify the Agreement on behalf of the Netherlands, to ratify, or try to adjust the treaty, do partly justice to the Dutch 'no' vote and then ratify an adjusted Agreement. So far he chose to go for the latter, the third option.

According to Rutte, a Dutch rejection of the treaty would be bad for the international relations and for the stability in Europe. Therefore, the prime minister argued for adjustments and gave some examples.

"The government thinks of a decision of states and governments, which establishes that the Association Agreement is no step towards or an entitlement to membership of the European Union for Ukraine," Rutte wrote in his letter to the House of Representatives.

"The government also thinks of the Agreement not imposing Member States an obligation to military cooperation, no access for Ukrainian workers to the EU labor market, nor an obligation to provide financial support to Ukraine," said Rutte.

Rutte cannot decide on his own. In the House of Representatives his government has a majority, but his plan also has to pass the Senate (De Eerste Kamer), in which the government parties VVD (Liberals) and PvdA (Labor) do not have a majority.

The adjustments of the agreement must be ratified during a European Council summit on Dec. 15 and 16 in Brussels.

Rutte says he has not concluded a deal with Dutch opposition parties yet on adjusting the Ukraine treaty, but will nevertheless continue negotiations on an adjustment with European leaders.

Last Friday he called on Dutch opposition parties to support him.

"In the national interest, I call on the reasonable forces in the country," said Rutte. Endit