The Prime Minister of the Netherlands, His Excellency Mark Rutte, will make an official visit to Australia as a guest of the Australian Government on 6-7 November.
Australia’s relationship with the Netherlands is founded on strong trade and investment ties, and people to people links.
Our close partnership has deepened over our mutual grief at losing citizens when MH17 was downed in July.
The Netherlands suffered the greatest loss in the crash – 196 of the 298 victims were Dutch.
In August I travelled to the Netherlands to personally thank Prime Minister Rutte for the Dutch led efforts to retrieve and identify the remains of those killed in the downing of MH17.
I was also able to thank Australian personnel then in the Netherlands for their work.
Prime Minister Rutte’s visit provides a good opportunity to discuss our continued cooperation on MH17, including the need for a thorough and robust investigation and for those responsible to be brought to justice.
I look forward to welcoming Prime Minister Rutte to Australia.
21 October 2014