HILVERSUM, 20/05/06 - A majority of the Dutch are against enlargement of the European Union by admitting Turkey and Eastern European countries. This has emerged from an Internet study carried out at the request of the cabinet.

The majority is opposed to EU accession of countries such as Turkey, Ukraine and most of the Balkan nations. The percentage of opponents varies from 50 in the case of Croatia to 69 for Turkey. The percentage against the accession of Albania, Ukraine and Serbia and Montenegro was also higher than 60. There were much fewer objections to the possible accession of Norway and Switzerland.

Rumania and Bulgaria's admission is in principle irreversible but is also rejected by a majority of 52 and 54 percent respectively. The European commission Tuesday decided that the two countries are permitted to join in 2007, provided they meet certain conditions. Possibly, their accession will be postponed to 2008.

The survey results are a setback for State Secretary for European Affairs Atzo Nicolai, who commissioned it. He did so in the wake of the Dutch referendum on the European Constitution on 1 June 2005, which received a 'no' vote from almost two-thirds of the population.

Almost 100,000 partook in the survey on the website www.nederlandineuropa.nl. Nicolai described this as a high result, considering the extensive survey took about 20 minutes to complete. The cabinet discussed the results internally on Friday.

Of the people who completed the survey, 70 percent are in favour of a common European asylum policy. Police services in EU countries should cooperate more efficiently, said 60 percent. Only 15 percent however felt a European police force would be a good idea.