NETHERLANDS – Politicians and officials named in court as ‘boy brothel’ case begins

Among those implicated are Prince Claus, the late husband of former queen Beatrix, the former finance minister and executive director of the international monetary fund Onno Rudding, and former Amsterdam mayor Ed van Thijn, the Algemeen Dagblad reports. Koos van Woudenberg, the first witness to give evidence, claimed to have been abused at a young age in the home of professor Ger van Roon in Amsterdam.

DUTCH NEWS — A court in Amsterdam has begun hearing testimony from nine witnesses into allegations that senior politicians knew about and used underage male prostitutes in the 1980s.

Among those implicated are Prince Claus, the late husband of former queen Beatrix, the former finance minister and executive director of the international monetary fund Onno Rudding, and former Amsterdam mayor Ed van Thijn, the Algemeen Dagblad reports. Koos van Woudenberg, the first witness to give evidence, claimed to have been abused at a young age in the home of professor Ger van Roon in Amsterdam.

He told the court he had performed oral sex on Rudding and saw Prince Claus at a bar ‘in relation to young boys’. The main witness in this hearing is Bart van Well, who claims to have been drugged and abused for several years.

Van Well said that at the age of 15 he was forced to have sex in the back seat of a car with Joris Demmink, then a top civil servant in the justice ministry.

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