The Romanian Ministry of Defense claims it was not informed by the Dutch Government about the allegations that the Hawk missiles it bought from the Dutch caused cancer to their human handlers.
Cornelis van der Knaap, the Dutch deputy minister of defense, told the Dutch parliamentarians to the contrary, that the Romanians were fully informed about the controversial nature of their buy, and they were still very happy with it.
The sell of Hawk missiles to Romania prompted a parliamentary debate in the Dutch Lower House; on 1 February this year, Krista van Velzen, a socialist MP, asked the deputy minister van der Knaap about the 23.5 million euros contract.
"Given the certainty that the Romanian military will acquire the missilesâ launching systems I would like to know if the Romanians were informed about the health issues presumably caused by them. Wouldnât it be fairer to keep the missiles in The Netherlands, in safe storage, and avoid thus exporting health problems to other countries?" asked van Velzen.
To this question, van der Knaap answered at the time: "The debates in The Netherlands are obviously known to Romanians. We do not want to hamper our Romanian colleagues to buy the missiles because these are excellent equipment. The Romanians are pleased with the buy, and so are we. Thatâs all for the moment. In Romania the controversy around the Hawk systems is well known," van der Knaap said at the time.
In a parliamentary debate of 30 June, van Velzen addressed again the issue of the Dutch-Romanian contract and stated that it was unacceptable that the missiles were sold to Romania. She also asked if the Dutch Government was ready to take responsibility when Romanian military will become ill and it will accept for the systems to be returned to The Netherlands.
Van der Knaapâs answer was that "The Netherlands does not envisag
