THE HAGUE, 23/05/07 - Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen has said in a letter to parliament that Vlemmo NV does not exist as far as he knows. This company was named by US authorities as a link between Iraq and Osama bin Laden.

On or around 25 July 2002, the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (OUSDP) of the US gave a briefing entitled 'Assessing the Relationship Between Iraq and al-Qaida'. This alternative intelligence report wrote that Osama Bin Laden's al-Hijra Company had contacts with the Netherlands-based company Vlemmo NV, which was allegedly involved in the purchase by Iraq of military equipment, Verhagen confirmed.

But "the company Vlemmo is unknown in the Netherlands," according to the minister. "The company has never been registered with the Chamber of Commerce in the Netherlands and is also not known to the tax service. That the company may have served as a front for illegal arms trade with Iraq is equally unknown to me."

The 2002 OUSDP report was made public last month by the chairman of the US Senate's defence committee, Carl Levin. "The contents of the intelligence report has only become known to me following the recent publication of the document," said Verhagen.

The minister had been asked to react by Socialist Party (SP) MP Harry van Bommel. Verhagen has now sent the OUSDP report to the Lower House. Parts of it have been rendered illegible by the US authorities.

Verhagen comments that apparent differences of opinion between US authorities on the possible connections between Iraq and Al Qa'ida "are an internal US matter." Apart from this, he wishes to "once again stress that the justification for intervention in Iraq for the Netherlands did not lie in the possible involvement of Iraq in terrorism, but in non-compliance with the UN Security Council resolutions."