It has only been six years since a majority of Dutch voters voted against the Association Agreement with Ukraine, when an advisory referendum was held on it. Hardly anyone at the time stood up for stronger ties with Ukraine. That is almost impossible to imagine, now that the Netherlands has supplied weapons to Ukraine, more than 137 million euros for aid has been collected on Giro 555 and the willingness to receive Ukrainian refugees is great.
The voice of the activist group GeenPeil, which had enforced the referendum with signatures at the time, in opposition to the treaty, was loud. But in political The Hague it remained silent, no one in the cabinet stood up for Ukraine. Only two people were the face of the campaign before the association agreement: Michiel van Hulten, former chairman of the PvdA, and publicist Joshua Livestro.
Despite the Dutch ‘no’ that emerged from the referendum, the association agreement was signed anyway. But the negative attitude of the Dutch towards Ukraine has certainly had consequences, Van Hulten and Livestro now say. They agree with British newspaper commentator Simon Nixon The TimesThat tweeted: “The world of 2022 is a product of 2016.”
The fact that a majority of Dutch voters voted against the association agreement was, according to Nixon, a boost for Putin, just like Brexit and the election of Donald Trump in the US.
Leg out campaign
The referendum was a slap in the face for Ukrainians, Livestro now says. “Not even the result, but the tone of the campaign. The opposing team went in with their feet straight, everything that could be found about rancidity about Ukraine was used.” Ukraine was not a real country, the Nazis had great influence, perhaps they shot the MH17 plane out of the sky. All the disinformation you hear now from the Kremlin was also heard in 2016, Livestro says.
Russia saw the referendum as a ‘test case’ for the vote on Brexit and the American presidential elections later that year, Van Hulten thinks. “In the beginning I hardly realized what was happening, later I thought: this must have been Russian interference.” His timeline on Twitter was filled with messages that opposed the treaty. “I spent many evenings trying to answer. Because I was discussing with them, I couldn’t spend that time campaigning.”
It was, claims Van Hulten, the work of Russian trolls – accounts posting under a different name to manipulate public opinion. “We didn’t know about Russian trolls at the time, but they were also used later in the American elections. I think the referendum is a test case used to be.”
From research by NRC It turned out that in 2016 there were indeed Russian social media trolls active in Dutch, but the well-known Russian accounts were not much more active during the referendum campaign. The then Interior Minister Kajsa Ollongren (D66) claimed in 2017 that there was a Russian influence campaign, but was unable to provide convincing evidence.
Also read this interview with the initiators of the 2016 referendum: ‘We don’t care about Ukraine, it’s about a Nexit’
Information war
According to Van Hulten, the site of the pre-campaign was deliberately taken off the air several times. According to Van Hulten, there was also influence in the discussions organized in debate centres. He regularly met SP politician Harry van Bommel, who was against the treaty. “Van Bommel took a group of Ukrainians with him, who were pro-Russian, to show that Ukrainians themselves were not in favor of the association agreement. They asked the questions in such a room, and so dominated the discussion.”
Later revealed The New York Times that some of the “Ukrainians” actually came from Russia, and exactly followed the Kremlin’s line. Van Bommel also denied having collaborated with the Kremlin and stated that it was not his responsibility to verify the identity of the group.
The Netherlands, Livestro and Van Hulten conclude, has been naive. “Nobody was interested in Ukraine,” says Van Hulten. “Only a small group that was already professionally involved with Ukraine. No one realized we were on the front lines of an information war. We only saw that after the referendum on Brexit and the election of Trump in the US.”
Dutch politicians did not think they really needed to take a stand, Livestro says. “There was a vague unrest about Putin, but also the feeling: we should not tickle the Russian bear too much. Well, now it turns out: he does what he wants after all.” The referendum served as a ‘warning’ for the politicians who took it too lightly. “The referendum was one big party for Putin, it strengthened him to continue on the same footing.”
EU membership
A lot has changed since 2016, says Van Hulten. “Thanks to the referendum and later Brexit and the election of Trump, we know better what is going on and we have started to arm ourselves against these kinds of strategies.” Forum for Democracy leader Thierry Baudet, who at the time had a prominent role in the campaign against the association agreement, “still repeats the texts of the Kremlin,” says Van Hulten. “But everyone knows now that it’s ridiculous. At the time, it was still taken for granted, but now it is being tackled.” Other parties distanced themselves from the Kremlin, says Van Hulten. “They don’t want to end up on the wrong side of history.”
Livestro thinks that the chance of Ukraine joining the European Union has increased because of the Russian invasion. “With the association agreement, that could be put on the back burner: we’ll see later whether EU membership is possible. But now that window has been slammed shut. We don’t know how the war will end, but suppose it comes to an end and Ukraine is still standing. Then the country will ask for a candidate for membership, and I don’t think it can be refused. The country has fought for this with great shedding of its own blood. A membership may not be possible immediately, the country must first be built up and continued to grow. But if you give Ukraine the prospect of a membership, it will be understood.”