Jelle van Buuren in NPO Radio 1 on 'Should the Netherlands recall IS fighters?'
The US President called upon his European allies to take back IS fighters from their countries. It concerns 800 fighters who were arrested by US troops during the war with IS. Forty of the 800 fighters are Dutch and want to return to the Netherlands.
Jelle van Buuren, assistant professor at Leiden University - Institute of Security and Global Affairs, agrees with Trump's statement. "He absolutely has a point, Europe has a responsibility, otherwise you leave the problem with the Kurds."
Risk
"We see no reason to bring these people back", says Antoinette Laan, VVD chamber member. She says the risk is too big and she does not want the government to import this problem. ‘They (the Syrian people) have chosen to destroy our country and the Dutch.’
According to Van Buuren, you can better control the Syrian people when they are here, but he admits: ‘You also take a risk, because at some point they will be released again and you cannot assume that everyone has come to repentance.’
Listen to the fragment on NPO 1 (Dutch).
See also BN DeStem (Dutch).