Speech by Mayor Jozias van Aartsen at the reception for the honorary consuls, 11 June 2012

Speech by Mayor Jozias van Aartsen at the reception for the honorary consuls, 11 June 2012

Excellencies,
Ladies and gentlemen,

It gives me the greatest of pleasure to receive you, the honorary consuls of the Netherlands and the members of the Association des Consuls La Haye, here in the atrium of our town hall in the heart of our international city of peace and justice.

Where some 18,000 people work, day in and day out, to create a better, safer and more peaceful world. A world without chemical weapons, without ethnic cleansing. A world in which conflicts between states are settled not on the battlefield, but in the court room. A world where the rule of law reigns, not the rule of the mob. And those who think they can flout the rule of international law, like Ratko Mladic, Thomas Lubanga or Charles Taylor, are held to account by the world - in The Hague.

The Hague’s Peace Palace stands as a symbol of our city’s unique position. It would never have been built without the support of the Scottish-American steel magnate Andrew Carnegie. On August 28th 2013, it will be exactly a hundred years ago that the Palace was inaugurated. Naturally, we will be celebrating this centenary in grand style. I hope that you will also be able to attend this festive event.

The imposing Peace Palace but, above all, the institutions it houses – the International Court of Justice, the Permanent Court of Arbitration, the Hague Academy and the famous library – represent centuries of tradition. A tradition associated with people like Tobias Asser, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, and the legendary Bertha von Suttner. There is a building named after her here in The Hague that houses various NGOs.

The construction of the Peace Palace gave the Netherlands its calling, or the ‘Vocation of Holland’, as Leiden’s international legal scholar Cornelis van Vollenhoven put it in 1910. Van Vollenhoven was a great champion of an international legal order and he was convinced that the Netherlands had a leading role to play in a supranational legal community. The Vocation of Holland ultimately became enshrined in our constitution.

In that light you should also see the ‘peace and justice’ project set up jointly by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the municipality of The Hague. The aim of this project is to put the Netherlands more firmly on the map over the next ten years as the worldwide centre of expertise in the area of peace and justice. Many parties are involved in this, such as the international courts, tribunals and research institutes established here. But you too, the honorary consuls, have an important part to play in this. Because you are, after all, particularly well placed to be able to make the Netherlands’ name known as a centre of international law. The ministry and we would be more than willing to help you with this.

And that endorsement of the Netherland’s reputation does not have to be limited purely to legal matters. In the area of security too, The Hague is increasingly developing into an international knowledge hub. The Hague Security Delta was recently set up, an innovation which will enable various public bodies and the private sector to work together more closely.

Two months ago, Cecilia Malmström, European Commissioner for Home Affairs, announced the establishment of a new European Cybercrime Centre at Europol in The Hague, which will become the focal point in the EU’s fight against cybercrime. 

In the areas of security and the international rule of law, the commercial sector and the world of international law and international cooperation can help to strengthen and inspire one another. Entirely in the spirit of Tobias Asser who, apart from being a great jurist, was always a businessman. And Hugo de Groot, the father of international law, as long ago as the seventeenth century argued that the international community should by no means consist only of nation states, but also be made up of individuals, companies and groups which today we would describe as ‘non-state actors’. We see all of these parties coming together in The Hague.

The international character of our city is rooted in its distant past. The Hague has always been an open city. Unlike other cities, The Hague has never had city walls. That openness has remained, right up to today. It was due to this decidedly cosmopolitan climate that The Hague was also able to develop into a centre for the arts and a refuge for free thinkers. And it has been so since the days of Spinoza.

It will therefore not surprise you that The Hague is standing as a candidate to host the European Capital of Culture in 2018.  Because, essentially, we have everything we need to be able to do that. Shortly, the dancers of the world famous Nederlands Dans Theater and musicians from the equally renowned Royal Conservatoire will be giving you a foretaste of  the cultural wealth which is typical of The Hague.

For the time being I wish you a very enjoyable evening and a pleasant stay in The Hague. And when you return to your home country, remember, you can always count on The Hague!