The Hague important for CNN breaking news

‘You can see that The Hague is an international city when you look at the presidential primary elections in the United States’, explains Matthijs Spits, manager CNN International BeNeLux. ‘There is great interest here in the race for the White House.’

CNN can gauge interest in its news stories by the number of followers on Twitter and Facebook, TV audience, website visitors and downloads of its apps. Spits says that ever since he has worked for CNN, now 15 years, the news channel has been greatly popular in this UN city. He receives queries from international organisations and ministries in The Hague about CNN reports and live broadcasts.

‘This is only logical with so many international institutes and embassies. CNN reporters will travel regularly to The Hague again this year, for example to report on trials at the International Criminal Court.’

Matthijs Spits is currently working on getting Wolf Blitzer, one of CNN’s most important political reporters in the U.S., to come to The Hague to give a series of lectures on American politics and the presidential elections. A similar lecture series was organised four years ago with (CNN's senior political analyst) Bill Schneider. President Obama has also promised to visit The Hague and CNN says in that case it would set up shop here to provide extensive reporting and breaking news.

The Netherlands and The Hague are both important to CNN. The Netherlands is one of the largest investors in the U.S. and a number of large multinationals like Shell, Siemens and Aegon have their headquarters in The Hague while Philips, Heineken and ING have offices elsewhere in the country. Most of the CEOs appear regularly on the news channel and a large number of companies advertise on CNN.

The Netherlands is usually in the list of the top 10 countries which visit CNN.com.

Translated from AD/Haagsche Courant, 6 January 2012