Amsterdam - Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen should convince NATO to appoint an independent inspector-general to supervise Afghanistan's reconstruction, Dutch legislator Femke Halsema said in the Dutch parliament on Tuesday.

If the North Atlantic Treaty Organization does not want to appoint such an official in Afghanistan, then the Netherlands should appoint an inspector-general itself, Halsema said.

The leader of the Greens Party was speaking following the recent report in the US daily The New York Times citing a draft US federal government document as saying the

Amsterdam - Amsterdam's gays are planning special Christmas celebrations this year with their first "Pink Christmas" festival due to start on Thursday.

The ten-day festival organized by the Dutch ProGay Foundation includes a special Christmas fair on December 21, a manger stall with two live Josephs and two live Marys, as well as a gay church mass on Christmas day.

Most of the activities are located in and around the Reguliersdwarsstraat, known for its many gay venues, in the old city centre.

During the accompanying film festival - the Pink Film Nights - more than hundred films will be shown in several cinemas throughout the city.

Amsterdam  - Marijuana may still rank third on the list of most popular export Dutch products, but the liberal Dutch approach to drugs and sex seems to have ended in the Netherlands.

In a new attempt to curb crime seen as linked to the sex and drugs trade across the Netherland, several major Dutch cities decided dramatically to cut back their officially regulated local prostitution zones in 2008.

Dutch mayors joined forces to close down or replace their local 'coffee shops' - stores were so-called soft drugs are sold legally.

In addition, the Dutch parliament outlawed the sale of particular soft drugs, such as certain types of mushrooms, that had only been legalized a few years earlier.

Amsterdam - The number of Dutch right-wing extremist rallies increased from eight to 12 in 2007, but extreme-right activists committed less incidents involving violence, an annual study released Thursday showed.

The 2008 study on racism and extremism by the Anne Frank Foundation and the University of Leiden said the number of violent incidents committed by Dutch extremists dropped by almost 10 per cent from 259 in 2006 to 223 in 2007, the lowest number in the past 10 years.

At the same time, extreme-right nationalists increasingly sought confrontations with individuals and the police.

Amsterdam - The major organizations active in the Dutch residential real estate market want the government to take extra measures to boost home sales, Dutch media reported on Thursday.

The organizations sent a letter to Minister of Residential and Urban Affairs Eberhard van der Laan (Labour) requesting special measures to boost the home market.

On Wednesday the Central Bureau of Statistics said the number of home sales in November dropped by more than 50 per cent compared with the same month last year.

Amsterdam - Dutch Muslim organizations remained unimpressed by the 15-minute film An interview with Mohammed produced by Iranian- born Ehsan Jami and released on Tuesday.

Six organizations for Moroccan Muslims called the film "meaningless" and refrained from further comments.

The six organizations said Jami's film did not contribute to the debate about contemporary Islam.

"We wish Ehsan Jami much success in his further career as filmmaker," the organizations said in a joint statement.