India’s Viswanathan Anand has defeated the joint leader Vladimir Kramnik in just 45 moves in the 11th round of the 72nd Corus Chess Tournament (CCT) at Wijk aan Zee in Amsterdam on Saturday.

Anand dominated throughout the game as he exchanged his rook for a knight to avoid draw and traded his second rook for a minor piece. Kramnik, with Petroff defense with black pieces, decided to accept his defeat after two advanced central passed pawns of Anand.

Amsterdam, Jan 12 - Miep Gies, the woman who preserved the diary of Anne Frank after Nazis seized the child from her hiding place in the Netherlands, has died, her website said.

Gies was 100 years old. She died Monday night.  (dpa)

Amsterdam, Dec 30 : The Netherlands plans to require full-body scanners as soon as possible for US-bound passengers travelling from Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport, reports said Wednesday.

Dutch Justice Minister Ernst Hirsch Ballin told US Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano via telephone that the Netherlands planned to implement the use of the scanners in the aftermath of the attempted bombing of a Detroit-bound flight on Christmas Day.    

Amsterdam - Dutch crown prince Willem Alexander and his wife Maxima will sell their luxury villa in the impoverished southern African country of Mozambique once it is completed, the prince wrote in a letter to Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende Friday.

The royal couple are among a small group of wealthy investors involved in developing an opulent estate that includes 220 villas and a five-star holiday resort on the Machangulo peninsula in southern Mozambique.

Amsterdam - Dutch Fortis/ABN Amro bank is to receive 4.4 billion euros (6.6 billion dollars) in extra state support, Finance Minister Wouter Bos wrote in a letter to parliament on Thursday.

The move marks the third time in one year the state comes to the rescue of the Dutch division of ABN Amro and Fortis banks.

On October 4, 2008, the Netherlands paid 16.8 billion euros to nationalize Fortis bank Netherlands, which also comprised ABN Amro Bank. The government later said it intended to merge both banks.

Amsterdam - Dutch and foreign nationals residing in the Netherlands should be prosecuted if they force others into marriage abroad, Justice Minister Ernst Hirsch Ballin wrote parliament on Wednesday.

Hirsch Ballin was responding to an appeal by lawmakers to the government to step up measures to curb forced marriages abroad.

Every year, an estimated several hundred teenage girls, most of Moroccan and Turkish descent, do not return to the Netherlands from a summer vacation abroad. It is believed many are married off against their will.

Amsterdam  - Dutch Royal Ahold NV saw its third quarter net income increase by 20.8 per cent compared with the same quarter last year, the international food retailer said in its quarterly report released on Wednesday.

Amsterdam-based supermarket chain Ahold said its net income amounted to 238 million euros (354 million dollars) in the third quarter, more than the 188 million euros expected by analysts.

Amsterdam  - Immigrants in the Netherlands should purchase a home there rather than in their native countries, the Dutch government said in a new integration policy mission statement released on Tuesday.

Some 40 per cent of Moroccan and 26 per cent of Turkish immigrants are homeowners, compared with 60 per cent of native Dutch nationals.

Immigrants should make a "conscious choice" to invest in a home and future in the Netherlands, the mission statement said.

Amsterdam  - Women are not less ambitious than men, according to study in the Netherlands.

The study, carried out by a team of researchers from the Radboud University in Nijmegen and Research en Beleid, a public policy research bureau, said women find it just as important as men to develop themselves personally and professionally.

However, the study found, women are more focused on content and depth, while men concentrate on "hierarchical growth" and salary.

Amsterdam  - Dutch police detained a Somali national over the past weekend for alleged involvement in jihadist (holy war) activities in the United States, Rotterdam's public prosecutor spokesman said Tuesday.

The 43-year-old man was arrested in an asylum-seeker's centre in Dronten in the northern Netherlands early Sunday at the request of US authorities who alleged that he was involved in jihadist activities.

Amsterdam - Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende told parliament on Tuesday he has not been approached for the new position of president of the European Union (EU).

"I have not been asked for the job," Balkenende told lawmakers.

However, Balkenende admitted he had been in contact on several occasions with Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt - the current EU chairman.

Reinfeldt is consulting European leaders about their preferred candidates for the presidency, and high representative for foreign affairs - the new posts created by the Lisbon Treaty.

Amsterdam  - Share prices for British-Dutch food multinational Unilever dropped Thursday morning after the company reported third quarter turnover which fell short of analysts predictions.

By 10 am (0900 GMT), Unilever shares had fallen 2.5 per cent to 20.28 euros (29.94 dollars) on the Amsterdam stock exchange.

In the third quarter, the food multinational said turnover had dropped to 10.2 billion euros, from 10.43 billion euros a year earlier. It was also below analysts' forecasts of
10.48 billion euros.

Amsterdam  - Dutch health authorities have recorded a first case of a swine flu-infected patient resistant to the anti-viral drug Tamiflu.

The Royal Institute for Public Health and the Environment RIVM said the patient had been hospitalized, but declined to identify the hospital or provide further details about the patient's condition.

The RIVM, located in De Bilt in the central Netherlands, also said the patient's relatives were currently being tested for swine flu.

Amsterdam  - Dutch KLM will be the first airline to fly a passenger flight using bio-diesel, the airline claimed on Wednesday.

The Boeing 747 flight, carrying a limited number of passengers, will take off on November 23 using a mixture of bio-fuel and conventional kerosene jet oil.

The type of bio-fuel is camelina, a substance extracted from an oil plant. Studies have shown camelina-based jet fuel to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by as much as 80 percent.

The new fuel mixture does not require any modifications to the aircraft or engine.

Amsterdam  - A Dutch underage teen planning to sail solo around the world will remain under state custody until July 1, the civil youth court in Utrecht ruled on Friday.

The decision comes following two months during which Laura Dekker, 14, was also placed under state custody upon request of the Child Protection Services.

During this period, a court-appointed psychologist evaluated the girl to determine whether she would be capable of undertaking the two-year voyage.

Amsterdam  - Dutch navigation device maker TomTom on Wednesday reported a third-quarter profit of 31 million euros, 10 million euros more than in the previous quarter but markedly less than in the corresponding period in 2008.

The Amsterdam-based company produces portable navigation aids for vehicles and mapping software for handheld computers. TomTom generated 58 million euros in profit in the third quarter last year, a period corresponding with summertime demand for navigation equipment.

Amsterdam - The Dutch court on Tuesday ruled that the city of Eindhoven was not authorized to ban a convicted paedophile from resettling there following his release from jail.

The court in Den Bosch in the southern Netherlands said that even if there was reasonable fear the man might reoffend, it did not imply the concrete and immediate disturbance of public order as argued by the city.

Amsterdam  - Dutch financial giant ING Group is to separate its insurance and investment management branches from its banking division, the company announced in a statement Monday.

By 2013, ING is to divest all its insurance and investment management operations as part of its previously announced Back to Basics programme intended to restructure and streamline the bank's activities.

ING also announced preliminary third-quarter results which showed that underlying net results were expected to amount to 750 million euros.

Amsterdam - Dutch labour unions expressed relief Tuesday over the sale of ABN Amro Bank's subsidiary Hollandse Bank Unie (HBU) to Deutsche Bank, according to media reports.

"The 1,400 HBU employees finally have certainty," said Joop Hofland, spokesman of labour union De Unie.

"This also removes the most important obstacle for a merger of ABN Amro and Fortis Netherlands banks," he added.

Amsterdam - Dutch politician and Islam-critic Geert Wilders is due to travel to Britain later this week, the Netherlands' Freedom Party said Wednesday, following the lifting of a British travel ban on him.

The announcement came a day after Britain's Asylum and Immigration Tribunal rescinded a travel ban imposed on him by the British government earlier this year.

Wilders now intends to travel to Britain on Friday, following his refusal of entry in February. T