Daily Times

While we look at the changing picture of intelligence and policing priorities in the Netherlands, it appears that the country has become embroiled in a deep security crisis as its war on radicalisation is causing the social and political alienation of minorities. Like in Romania, Poland, Malaysia, India and Pakistan, intelligence and security sector reforms received little attention from the successive governments in the past. With the changing intelligence and security picture in Europe, the development, coordination and articulation of national security policies of countries have become critically important. The Dutch police system has been under pressure from communities and outlaw elements since the 2000s, therefore, critical debates have often pointed towards the need for deep reforms. Insecurity and administrative problems for the Dutch police are too irksome. The recent police reforms in the country are characterised by one-sided centralisation of policing policy, while the local dimension has been left out of reforms. From outside the Netherlands policing reforms look strong with a professional arrangement but if we look inside the organisation, it is quite weak. Moreover, the Netherlands’ Country Police Act does not provide much information about local policing or what kind of policing is needed.

After the Cold War era, the Netherlands’ national security apparatus experienced a changing reorganisation process. Many law enforcement and security policies were framed to tackle the menace of political Islam and emerging cyber security threats but these policies proved ineffective in intercepting Arab extremists dancing in the streets of Amsterdam, Hague and Rotterdam from 2004 to 2015. With these evolving national security threats, the principles of traditional law enforcement and intelligence information gathering also changed. After 9/11 and the emergence of political Islam in the Netherlands, extremism and radicalisation further transformed the culture of law enforcement and the intelligence mechanism. The recent killings in France left diverse impact on social stratification while the trend of racism rose again and discrimination took root in mainstream society with uncontrollable speed.

On November 27, 2015, the government submitted four bills to parliament on the integrated approach towards tackle jihadism, combatting violent groups and managing the prevailing radicalisation in the country. The plan contained strong preventive measures important for law enforcement authorities, which set the countering terrorism strategy as a first priority. Under the second bill: “The passport and identity of anyone who is subject to a travel ban imposed by the minister of security and justice will be cancelled automatically with immediate effect.” This bill is not so different from the travel ban in the UK. This is meant to prevent jihadists from travelling to Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen and other violence affected states.

As the country faces the precarious threat of cyber terrorism, another bill was also introduced in parliament to counter financial and economic terrorism with an effective cyber security strategy. In 2011, the Netherlands’ government published its first cyber security strategy to counter the prevailing culture of hacking important data from state institutions. In 2013, the strategy was reviewed and published to easily identify cyber terrorists and professional criminals. Digital fraud and theft of information became common while financial terrorism continued to target banks and local industry. As digital espionage remained a violent threat in the country, on November 17, 2015, the government published an updated version of its Cyber Security Assessment. However, in view of the exacerbating threat of cyber terrorism and hacking in the country, the government also submitted the first cyber security bill to the house of parliament.

In Netherlands, jihadism has spread across the country into a complex and dynamic movement, which poses a precarious challenge to the national security of the country. A recent report of Dutch intelligence, AIVD, is a stern warning to the law enforcement authorities and to the government in power that terrorist networks pose serious security threats. Wars in Afghanistan, Syria and Yemen provoked violent forces in the country. Home-grown extremism has also forced the government and law enforcement agencies to introduce laws and reorganise preventive measures.

On November 9, 2015, police seized an offensive cartoon of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) during a protest rally against Islamisation in the Netherlands. Dutch news reported that the police arrested 32 protestors. However, Militant Islam Monitor also reported that a Dutch Air Force Sergeant, a 26-year-old Moroccan-Dutch joined Islamic State (IS) in Syria. According to a Dutch newspaper (De Telegraaf), the air force sergeant had access to secret information. Police across the country have kept 350 extremist Muslims under secret surveillance, of which 130 live in Hague. The involvement of a growing number of Dutch jihadists in sectarian conflicts in the Middle East and Persian Gulf regions causes pain to the state’s security agencies. Police and intelligence agencies have so far not succeeded in preventing jihadists from going to war zones in Syria, Iraq and Yemen. Though the government claims that 38 measures within the Integrated Approach to Jihadism Action Programme is the answer to jihadist threat but, in a true sense, many things are not going in the right direction as the police have failed to closely monitor sleeper cells across the country. In 2013, the interior ministry confiscated 150 passports of those who had intended to leave the country for jihad and more than 90 social benefits paid to jihadists were cancelled but no improvement occurred in addressing this issue.

This way of addressing jihadism has been severely criticised in intellectual circles and by local media outlets. The network of IS is spreading across the country with uncontrollable speed as the government has entered an unending war with it. “IS is our enemy and that is why we are at war,” the Dutch prime minister said. On October 5, 2015, on the occasion of updating the 38th edition of the Terrorist Threat Assessment, the minister of security and justice announced that the threat of terror attack was real. Threats to the security of the Netherlands are consecutively changing and are becoming increasingly intertwined. Though the Dutch intelligence is competent in countering radicalisation in the country, a clear picture of preventive measures is still bleak.

The writer is author of The Prospect of Nuclear Jihad in Pakistan and can be reached at zai.musakhan222@gmail.com