The Netherlands: What the Dutch can teach the world about remote work - by Katie Bishop

If you’ve been balancing your laptop on a precarious stack of cookbooks, or lamented VPN speed from your kitchen table, you’re not alone. Ever since restrictions were put in place to slow the spread of Covid-19, companies have been scrambling to enable colleagues to work from home.

As we adapt to the much-cited ‘new normal’, some experts are predicting that remote work might be here to stay. This is leaving many nervously eyeing up our makeshift home desk set-ups, and wondering how on earth we can handle the backache.

But for some, remote working is just another day at the office .Thousands of workers in the Netherlands benefit from the country’s astonishingly flexible work culture. While the percentage of employed persons usually working remotely before the coronavirus outbreaklingered at around 4.7% in the UK, and 3.6% in the US, 14.1% of the Netherland’s workforce reports usually working away from the office. The Netherlands has long led the global shift toward remote work, with only Finland
catching up in recent years while other countries lag behind.

“When the pandemic started, I suddenly found myself playing the part of a remote-work coach for my wife and our neighbours,” says Yvo van Doorn, an Amsterdam-based engineer. “I was suddenly answering questions about home networks and video conferencing. It was eye-opening because I’d taken these things for granted.”


Read more at: 
What the Dutch can teach the world about remote work - BBC Worklife

Pollution - The Netherlands to ban many single-use plastics by next summer - by Victoria Séveno

Good news for the environment! The Netherlands will ban a number of single-use plastic products from July 2021, in an effort to protect our beaches and oceans.

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The Netherlands to ban many single-use plastics by next summer

EU-Coronavirus:Travel Lists: Revealed: Draft list of countries that will be allowed to enter EU when borders open

Locked away in a meeting room in Brussels, officials are debating who will be allowed to enter the EU on July 1 when the bloc's international borders are scheduled to be opened - and who will be forbidden.

Read more at:
Revealed: Draft list of countries that will be allowed to enter EU when borders open | Euronews

The Netherlands: Britons and Swedes Remain Subject to Quarantine When Traveling to the Netherlands

Authorities in the Netherlands have decided to keep the quarantine rule
in place for nationals of the United Kingdom and Sweden, due to the
Coronavirus developments, the Dutch government announced in a notice.

Read more at:
Britons and Swedes Remain Subject to Quarantine When Traveling to the Netherlands - SchengenVisaInfo.com

European Aircraft Industry ; Netherlands agrees to contribute 3.4 billion euros to Air France-KLM bailout

The Dutch government has reached a deal with France to contribute 3.4 billion euros ($3.8 billion) to an Air France-KLM (AIRF.PA) bailout that had strained relations between the airline group’s state shareholders, sources told Reuters.

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Netherlands agrees to contribute 3.4 billion euros to Air France-KLM bailout - Reuters

The Netherlands: It's officially summer in the Netherlands, with a hot, sunny week ahead

The Netherlands has a hot, sunny week ahead, with the temperature reaching as high as 32 Celsius on Thursday, according to weather forecaster KNMI.

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tt's officially summer in the Netherlands, with a hot, sunny week ahead - DutchNews.nl

The Netherlands: Kurdish Iranian politician survives assassination attempt in the Netherlands: - by Wladimir van Wilgenburg

Sadegh Zarza, the 64-year-old former leadership member of the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (PDKI), survived an assassination attempt on Saturday in the Dutch city of Leeuwarden, an attack his family has blamed on the Iranian government.

Dutch police arrested a 38-year-old male Iranian national at the scene and have begun interrogating him as part of their investigation.

According to the Leeuwarden Courant, a former classmate in Iran recently called Zarza in the Netherlands and asked, as a favor, that he provide some assistance to his son who was about to begin studies in Rotterdam. Zarza agreed to meet the son at the Leeuwarden train station.

Read more at:
Kurdish Iranian politician survives assassination attempt in the Netherlands: Local media

Netherlands reports no daily deaths caused by COVID-19

The Netherlands reported zero novel coronavirus-related deaths forthe first time since March, with 69 new infections in the last 24 hours.

According to the National Institute for Public Health and theEnvironment (RVIM), only two more people diagnosed with COVID-19 wereadmitted to the

Read more at :
Netherlands reports no daily deaths caused by COVID-19

NATO: France and Turkey fracture Nato on Libya - "as Erdogan plays a dangerous game he could lose"- by Andrew Rettman

"Who cares about the EU or NATO ? Trump  agrees with me"

Nato is to investigate French allegations that Turkish warships targeted a French one in a confrontation over the Libya conflict, which has divided allies.

"The incident in the Mediterranean [Sea] was addressed in the meeting by several allies", Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg said after Nato defence ministers held video-talks on Thursday (18 June).

"We have made sure that Nato military authorities are investigating the incident to bring full clarity to what happened," he said.

Turkish warships locked their weapons systems on to a French frigate called the Courbet, which was part of a Nato monitoring mission called Sea Guardian, on 10 June, according to France.

And they did it in order to slip through yet another illegal shipment of arms to Turkey's ally in the Libya civil war, the Tripoli-based Government of National Accord (GNA), France said.

Note EU-Digest:  Curious - Whenever, or each time we put the President of Turkey's name ,Erdogan into the "Labels" column of our blog (EU-Digest), we were posting, the blog reported an error, and we had to go back and re-post the entire content of the blog, and rewrite the "labels"  removing Erdogan's name for it to work. Does this mean censorship by either some internal or external "source", or is it a real technical error? This is not the first time it happened when other sensitive issues were published.

Read more at:
France and Turkey fracture Nato on Libya

USA - Wholesale - Costco: The Enduring Enigma of Costco's $1.50 Hot Dog and Soda Combo

When Costco president W. Craig Jelinek once complained to Costco co-founder and former CEO Jim Sinegal that their monolithic warehouse business was losing money on their famously cheap $1.50 hot dog and soda package, Sinegal listened, nodded, and then did his best to make his take on the situation perfectly clear. 

"If you raise [the price of] the effing hot dog, I will kill you," Sinegal said. "Figure it out."

Read more at: The Enduring Enigma of Costco's $1.50 Hot Dog and Soda Combo

The Netherlands - Housing: The Netherlands struggling to meet housing demand

In the Netherlands, the number of homeless people has doubled in recent years and 300,000 new houses are urgently needed. But because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the yearly target will not be met.

To create both houses and jobs, local officials and developers havemade an urgent plea to the government to invest billions of Euros.

Read more at: 
The Netherlands struggling to meet housing demand | Netherlands 2017 News | Al Jazeera

The Netherlands: Amsterdam isn't just Europe's 'sin city': It's the Eucharistic heart of The Netherlands

The annual Corpus Christi procession along the Amsterdam canals was canceled due to coronavirus prevention measures.

Read  more:
https://cruxnow.com/church-in-europe/2020/06/amsterdam-isnt-just-europes-sin-city-its-the-eucharistic-heart-of-the-netherlands/

The Netherlands: EVA architecten completes energy-neutral special education school in the Netherlands

The school is specifically designed for special education  cluster 2, where the overview for student and teacher is of great  importance. each group room has its own toilet and an additional workplace as a shelter zone. each cluster of four group rooms has its own learning area adjacent to the central patio. the patio orms a resting point where both pupils and teachers can isolate and relax. the patio provides daylight on the learning squares and connects the different clusters spatially and visually.T

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EVA architecten completes energy-neutral special education school in the netherlands

Belgium - Netherlands: In a town of two nations, Belgian bars are shuttered. Dutch pubs will soon be open across the street

Like so many small business owners, Monic van der Krogt has been hit hard by the coronavirus. The terrace of her cafe and beer garden in this small Belgian town sits empty.

Her story, though, is not entirely universal. While her town is Belgian,bit's also Dutch -- or at least partially. Walk two minutes down theroad, and you're in the Netherlands. Walk a bit further, and you're back in Belgium.

Read more at`
In a town of two nations, Belgian bars are shuttered. Dutch pubs will soon be open across the street - CNN

The Netherlands: The Simple Dutch Cure for Stress

Recently I was in San Francisco, a city known for its tech companies, steep hills, and fierce winds. Each day’d run around the neighborhood and up through the park, ending with aspectacular view of the Golden Gate Bridge. Back in my AirBnB, I’d feelenergized and refreshed, fingers tingling from the breeze. It was cold, exhausting, but completely exhilarating.

As it turns out, there’s a unique term, from the Dutch, for this sort of pastime. In the Netherlands, people have been seeking out windy exercise for more than a hundred years. Today, the practice is so common that it’s known as “uitwaaien.” It “literally translates to‘outblowing,’” explains Caitlin Meyer, a lecturer at the University of Amsterdam’s Department of Dutch Linguistics. “It’s basically theactivity of spending time in the wind, usually by going for a walk or abike ride.” Meyer has lived in the Netherlands for more than 20 yearsand has come to specialize in the language, despite being a non-nativespeaker. She says uitwaaien is a popular activity where she lives—onebelieved to have important psychological benefits. “Uitwaaien issomething you do to clear your mind and feel refreshed—out with the badair, in with the good,” she tells me. “It’s seen as a pleasant, easy, and relaxing experience—a way to destress or escape from daily life.”

Read more at :
The Simple Dutch Cure for Stress

Netherlands: Islamist group planned to attack Gay Pride event

A Dutch Islamist group planned toattack the Gay Pride in Amsterdam in 2018, according to the hearing on Friday of witnesses at the trial of six suspects arrested two years agoand tried in Rotterdam.

According to the testimony of a witness, an undercover police officer said that thehead of the network, identified only by the name of Hardi N., hadplanned to attack the event which attracts tens of thousands of peopleevery year.

Read more at:
i24NEWS - Netherlands: Islamist group planned to attack Gay Pride event

Travel: between EU and US: Americans Unlikely To Be Welcome To Europe In July, Here’s Why - by Tamara Thiessen

Europe is set to lift its border restrictions on international travelers in July. But only starting with countries with low infection levels, which rules out Americans and those arriving from the U.S.

In other words tourism and holidaying will begin in Europe from July 1, but not for everybody. The criteria for the lifting of the Europe travel ban will probably bar tourists from Brazil, Russia, Argentina and Iran too, as other holidaymakers return. Europe will also remain off limits to travelers from other high-risk countries where Covid-19 infection rates remain high.

Note, “The EU travel restriction is based on residence, not nationality,” says a spokesperson for the European Commission in Brussels. “Similarly, decisions on lifting travel restrictions would also concern non-EU nationals residing in a specific country"

Read more at: 
Travel: Americans Unlikely To Be Welcome To Europe In July, Here’s Why

The Netherlands: Another floating solar park goes online in the Netherlands – pv magazine International

Dutch water supplier Evides Waterbedrijf has completed the construction of a 1.62 floating solar power plant at a reservoir in Kralingen, near Rotterdam. 

The plant is expected to cover around 15% of the electricity demand of the company’sadjacent facility, with estimated annual power generation of1.7 million kWh.

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Another floating solar park goes online in the Netherlands – pv magazine International

USA: Hundreds of Thousands Sign Petitions Urging the U.S. Government to Declare KKK a Terrorist Group

Hundreds and thousand people are declaring that the Ku Klux Klan be listed as a terrorist organization, with several online petitions rapidly gaining support.

A number of change.org petitions have gone viral this week demanding the white supremacist hate group be classified as terrorists, prompting them to be included among the top trends on Twitter.

One such petition calling for the KKK to be declared a terrorist organization reached 100,000 signatures before it closed.

The white supremacist hate group are currently only listed as a domestic extremists, who are prosecuted differently to terrorists.

Read more at: 
Hundreds of Thousands Sign Petitions Urging the U.S. Government to Declare KKK a Terrorist Group:

International Travel - President Trump: Europeans Can Soon Travel to US

Europeans from countries with low rates of Coronavirus infections maysoon be eligible to travel to the United States, President Donald Trump hinted at a press conference.

While presenting the fifth proclamation barring entry into the US for foreign
nationals who were physically present in Brazil within 14 dayspreceding their entry or attempted entry into the United States, Trumptold journalists that entry to the country would soon be possible for some travellers from Europe.

Read more at:
President Trump: Europeans Can Soon Travel to US - SchengenVisaInfo.com

USA - a thoroughly corrupt political process: Billionaires got $565 billion richer during the coronavirus pandemic

American billionaires are now nearly 20% richer — by $565 billion,to be exact — than they were at the start of the coronavirus pandemic,according to a new report by the Institute for Policy Studies

Six billionaires, including Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Tesla's Elon Musk, and Zoom's Eric Yuan, have seen their net worths grow by more than $2billion each since March, according to the think tank's analysis of Forbes' Billionaires List.

The coronavirus crisis has been an economic disaster for the rest of America, as an end unprecedented 42.6 million Americans filed for unemployment benefits in the past 11 weeks.

Note EU-Digest: This is another major problem facing America, and has resulted in the overwhelming influence Corporate America has on the political environment of the US and beyound. What's been happening with White House and Congressional politics could only be described as a thoroughly corrupt process, with the blessings of a Supreme Court dominated by justices hand-picked to protect the same process.

Read more at:
Billionaires got $565 billion richer during the coronavirus pandemic - Business Insider

The Netherlands: Amsterdam's Red-Light District to Remain Closed

The red-light district is one of the main tourist attractions in Amsterdam. While coronavirus lockdown restrictions are starting to ease, sex work is not allowed to resume until September.

Read more at:
https://www.voanews.com/covid-19-pandemic/amsterdams-red-light-district-remain-closed

NATO's Jens Stoltenberg has a wet dream : "NATO must become more political and global", says alliance chief Jens Stoltenberg

NATO needs to become politically stronger in order to face the challenges of the next decade, the head of the alliance said on Monday, highlighting that the rise of China is "fundamentally shifting the global balance of power".

Note EU-Digest: Yes indeed this is a wet dream, specially given the derogatory comments  President Trump of the US has made about European members of the NATO

Read more at:
NATO must become more political and global, says alliance chief Jens Stoltenberg | Euronews

The Netherlands: Anti-racism demos continue across the Netherlands, Eindhoven next up

Thousands of demonstrators took part in anti-racism rallies in the rain in Utrecht, Nijmegen and Enschede on Friday and more gatherings are planned for the next few days.

In Utrecht some 3,500 people assembled at the Jaarbeurs square near the main railway station, but officials used social media at around 7pm to urge people to stop coming because the space was too full.

In Nijmegen, demonstrators gathered in the Goffert park, where tape had been stretched out to show people where to stand at the proper distance from each other. Some 750 people had been expected to attend, but police photos put the number at around 1,000.

In Enschede, around 500 people took part in the demonstration on the Van Heekplein – the maximum agreed between organisers and the local authorities.

‘I was positively surprised at how many people took part,’ campaigner Mitchell Esajas told NPO radio. Esajas, who helped organise the earlier protests in Rotterdam and Amsterdam.

Read more at : Anti-racism demos continue across the Netherlands, Eindhoven next up - DutchNews.nl

Netherlands Opens for Tourists from 12 EU Countries from June 15 – Britons Not Included - SchengenVisaInfo.com

The Netherlands has decided to open its borders for the nationals ofseveral European countries starting from June 15, as the country easesentry restrictions introduced amid the Coronavirus outbreak in Europeback in March.

Tourists from 12 European countries that have lowerrates of COVID-19 will be eligible to holiday in the Netherlands as of June 15. Whereas sometime between June 15 to July 5, travellers from another 16 more countries will be eligible to enter the Netherlands.

Read more at:
Netherlands Opens for Tourists from 12 EU Countries from June 15 – Britons Not Included - SchengenVisaInfo.com

The Netherlands: Dutch PM deems ′Black Pete′ tradition racist

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte announced on Friday that he no longerwants the Netherlands to celebrate the Saint Nicholas tradition of"Black Pete," whereby white people in blackface, afro wigs and exaggerated red lipsticks portray delinquent Moorish slaves from Spain.

Rutte described his new view point during a parliamentary debate on Thursday about anti-racism demonstrations in solidarity with US demonstrationsafter American George Floyd — an unarmed black man — died in policecustody in Minneapolis.

Rutte said his attitude towards "Black Pete," known in the Netherlands as "Zwarte Piet,"  had changed since 2013. At the time, the prime minister had said: "Black Pete is just black and I
can't do much about that." Rutte said he now hopes that the traditionwill disappear in the Netherlands.

Read more at:
Dutch PM deems ′Black Pete′ tradition racist | News | DW | 05.06.2020

Suriname: Washington, the Hague Should Not Sidestep Events in Suriname - by Even Ellis

On May 25, voters in Suriname decisively rejected the National Democratic Party (NDP) of incumbent President Desi Bouterse. Bouterse’s NDP declined from 26 seats in the 51 seat National Assembly to 16, behind the 20 won by Chandrikapersad Santokhi’s United Reform Party (VHP). Despite Bouterse’s occupation of the office since August 2010, Santokhi is now poised to replace him.

The VHP has formed an alliance with three other parties, the National Party of Suriname (NPS), the Brotherhood and Unity in Politics (ABOP) party, and Pertjajah Luhur, leaving it one seat short of the 34 to choose the president.

In a system characterized by shady deals, shifting alliances, and political intrigue, Bouterse has ample resources, and strong motivation to avoid ceding power.

A generation of business and military elites have their fates tied to him through past patronage. Leaving the presidency implies losing the immunity which has protected Bouterse 1999 narcotrafficking charges in the Netherlands, and his conviction in Suriname for the 1982 murder of 15 opponents.

Read more at:
Washington, the Hague Should Not Sidestep Events in Suriname | Newsmax.com

US Economy; Complete disconnect between Wall Street and Main Street - by RM

Question, who or what is behind the major disconnect between Wall Street and reality, with stocks going up on the Dow for the past 4 days.Today by even more than 500 points, and this while economies are tanking all around the world, and while as many as 30% of the US workforce remains 
unemployed ?

Some companies obviously are making excessive profits as a result of the present emergency situation, but in no way is Wall Street a reflection of the state of the US economy, as President Trump likes to brag about.

The above is, however another clear indication of the great disparity between "the have and have nots" in the US and has to be remedied by an aggressive and progressive new Democratic government, before it destroys the USA from within.

EU-Digest

The Netherlands: Connectedness of the Dutch Economy Leads to Lower GDP Growth Forecast

 In this blog written for IMF Country Focus, the IMF’s mission  brief for the Netherlands, Alfredo Cuevas, explains that this economic integration could signal a slower recovery for the country from the crisis.

The GDP growth forecasts for the Netherlands issued by the IMF in its April 2020 World Economic Outlook (WEO) surprised many, not only for the large negative 2020 number itself, but for it being weaker than some other leading European economies. Let me make some general considerations about orecasting amid today’s immense uncertainties, and then look at the Dutch
economy.

Economists often conceptualize macroeconomic variables, such as real GDP growth, as the sum of a predictable or systematic component and an unpredictable shock. We develop and estimate statistical models of the predictable part and use them to make forecasts.

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Connectedness of the Dutch Economy Leads to Lower GDP Growth Forecast

EU: Lobbyist register to be tightened after Monsanto case - by Nikolaj Nielsen

Updated EU transparency rules set for the end of this year means lobbyists will have to declare much more accurate - and thus likely larger - figures on what they spend to influence EU decision-making.

The figures currently cited in the EU's joint transparency register are widely suspected of being under-reported.

The register is shared between the European Commission and the European Parliament, and lists thousands of companies, consultancies and NGOs that work to influence EU legislation.

The authority that oversees the register recently announced in a letter it would impose clearer rules to make sure lobbyists do not skirt their reporting obligations.

The issue came to a head when pro-transparency group Corporate Europe Observatory complained that the US giant Monsanto had failed to truly declare how much it spent in a campaign to steer the debate around its controversial weedkiller glyphosate.

Read more: Lobbyist register to be tightened after Monsanto case

Europeans don’t trust the US or Trump, poll says - by Annabelle Timsit

Donald Trump has damaged America’s standing in the world in his three years as president, and nowhere is this more apparent than in Europe.

A new report (pdf), published by the think tank European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR),  found that Europeans “no longer believe that the US can serve as the guarantor of their security.” They also overwhelmingly favor neutrality rather than siding with the US on global issues. The survey covered more than  60,000 people across 14 European Union member states, including France, Slovakia, Poland, and Spain.

Read more at: Europeans don’t trust the US or Trump, poll says — Quartz