Amsterdam - More than 3,000 people in the Netherlands have signed a petition demanding that the government overturn a law enabling it to store the fingerprints of all Dutch citizens in a central electronic database. Since September 21, everyone applying for a Dutch passport is obligated to provide four fingerprints for storage in a database that is accessible to municipal authorities, the national intelligence service AIVD and the Justice Department.
A group, calling itself Het Nieuwe Rijk (The New Empire) launched the online petition late Tuesday and has also distributed brochures in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague and Utrecht, comparing the move to administrative methods used by Nazis during World War II to persecute Jews.
In brochures, strongly resembling standard government brochures in layout, typesetting and language, Het Nieuwe Rijk offers to tattoo people's social security numbers on their left arms at no cost. The group suggests the tattoos that "passing through international borders" and dealing with the government would then go "smoother".
The Interior Affairs Ministry quickly released a statement saying it had filed a complaint with the police against the group for "misleading the public" with a brochure "which gives the impression it originates from the government."
Interior Affairs Deputy Minister Ank Bijleveld, the statement, distanced herself from "the tasteless content of the brochure which appeals to the memory of the Holocaust" and added: "People could be hurt by these associations."
A spokesman for the ministry confirmed to the German Press Agency
