Netherlands profile - Timeline

The Netherlands parliament building in The Hague

A chronology of key events:

1914-1918 - The Netherlands maintains its neutrality during World War One. Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany goes into exile in the Netherlands at the end of the war.

1932 - A 31-km dam is completed across the Zuider Zee forming a freshwater lake known as the Ijsselmeer. Part of the lake has since been drained and the reclaimed land used to grow crops.

1940 May - Nazi Germany invades, overwhelming the Dutch armed forces.

1944-5 - Dutch civilians suffering near-starvation in the "Hunger Winter" as fighting between Allied and German forces disrupt food supplies.

1945 - The Netherlands becomes a charter member of the United Nations.

1949 - The Dutch East Indies, which had been occupied by Japan during World War Two, becomes independent as Indonesia after a four-year independence struggle against Dutch colonial authorities.

1948 - Benelux customs union between Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands comes into effect.

1949 - The Netherlands abandons its policy of neutrality and becomes a founder member of Nato.

1952 - The Netherlands is a founding member of the European Coal and Steel Community, which is to become the European Economic Community five years later.

1963 - Colony of Netherlands New Guinea is ceded to Indonesia.

Dealing with the past

1975 - Dutch colony of Surinam achieves independence. Hundreds of thousands of Surinamese emigrate to the Netherlands.

1980 - Queen Juliana abdicates; Crown Princess Beatrix becomes queen.

1993 - Netherlands regulates euthanasia by doctors. Official estimates suggest that 2% of all deaths in the Netherlands each year are assisted.

1994 - Labour party leader Wim Kok becomes prime minister at the head of a three-party coalition.

1995 - Serious flooding leads to a state of emergency, with a quarter-of-a-million people evacuated from their homes.

1998 - Wim Kok re-elected as prime minister.

2000 - Parliament legalises euthanasia, setting strict conditions for doctors.

2001 April - In the first official ceremony of its kind, four homosexual couples are married in Amsterdam under new legislation. The new laws also allow homosexual couples to adopt children.

2002 January - Netherlands adopts the euro.

2002 April - Wim Kok's government resigns following official report criticising its role in the Srebrenica massacre in 1995 when just over 100 lightly armed Dutch peacekeepers failed to stop Bosnian Serb forces from murdering thousands of Muslims.

2002 May - Widespread shock as anti-immigration party leader Pim Fortuyn is killed by gunman. His party, formed three months earlier, comes second in elections. Moderately conservative Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA) led by Jan Peter Balkenende tops poll.

2002 July - Balkenende becomes prime minister in centre-right coalition with List Pim Fortuyn Party and liberal People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD).

2002 October - Balkenende's government collapses, brought down by infighting in List Pim Fortuyn Party.

2003 January - Narrow win in general election for Christian Democratic Appeal. Coalition talks begin.

2003 April - Animal rights activist Volkert van der Graaf sentenced to 18 years for Fortuyn killing. He said he saw Fortuyn as a threat to democracy. His subsequent appeal is rejected.

2003 May - Centre-right coalition sworn in with Balkenende as premier for second term. New coalition involves Balkenende's Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA), People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) and Democrats-66.

2004 March - Queen mother Juliana dies, aged 94. Juliana reigned for 32 years from 1948.

2004 November - Film-maker Theo Van Gogh is murdered. He was reported to have received death threats after his controversial film about the position of women in Islamic society. A radical Islamist is jailed for life for the murder in July 2005.

2005 June - Dutch voters reject a proposed EU constitution, days after a French referendum goes against the treaty.

Afghanistan mission

2006 February - Parliament agrees to send an additional 1,400 Dutch troops to join Nato-led forces in southern Afghanistan. The decision comes after weeks of wrangling and international pressure.

2006 June-July - Prime Minister Balkenende forms a temporary, minority government after his coalition collapses in a row over immigration, precipitating early elections in November.

Cabinet backs plans to ban the burqa - the full body and face covering - in public places.

2007 February - Jan Peter Balkenende is sworn in as head of a three-party centrist coalition, three months after general elections.

2009 January - Court orders right-wing politician Geert Wilders should stand trial for inciting hatred against Muslims for a film linking radical Islamists' actions to the Koran.

2009 May - Seven people are killed at a parade in a failed attack on the royal family.

2009 June - The right-wing Freedom Party, led by Geert Wilders, comes second in European elections in the Netherlands, winning 15% of the vote.

2010 February - The coalition government collapses following dispute over troops in Afghanistan.

2010 June - The centre-right Liberal Party emerges as largest party in parliamentary election.

2010 August - The Netherlands withdraws its 1,900 soldiers from Afghanistan, ending a four-year mission that had grown increasingly unpopular at home.

2010 October - After months of coalition talks, Liberal Party and Christian Democratic Appeal agree to form minority government with parliamentary support from Geert Wilders' right-wing Freedom Party.

The Netherlands Antilles is dissolved and Aruba, Curacao, St Maarten become nations within the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Bonaire, St Eustatius and Saba, became autonomous special municipalities of the Netherlands.

2011 June - Populist politician Geert Wilders is acquitted of charges that comments comparing Islam to Nazism constitute hate speech.

2011 July - A court rules the Dutch state responsible for the deaths of three Bosnian Muslims in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre.

2012 April - Prime Minister Mark Rutte resigns after the right-wing Freedom Party refuses to support an austerity budget.

A court upholds a draft law banning foreign tourists from entering cafes that sell cannabis in the three southernmost provinces.

2012 September - Prime Minister Mark Rutte's ruling Liberals win election with 41 seats in parliament, two more than centre-left Labour. The Eurosceptic and anti-immigrant Freedom Party sustains heavy losses.

Austerity

2012 November - Liberals and Labour form a coalition headed by Mark Rutte. The new government warns that tough austerity measures will be needed.

2013 April - Willem-Alexander becomes king.

2013 November - Netherlands contributes 380 peacekeeping troops to Mali as part of a UN-led mission that takes over from French forces who drove out Islamist and Tuareg insurgents earlier in the year.

2014 July - Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 travelling from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur is shot down over Ukraine, close to the border with Russia. The Netherlands declares national mourning for its 193 citizens who are among the 298 people killed.

2015 October - A report by the Dutch Safety Board concludes that flight MH17 crashed in rebel-held Ukraine because it was hit by a Russian-made Buk missile, but does not say who fired the missile.

2016 September - International prosecutors say flight MH17 was downed over eastern Ukraine in 2014 by a Buk missile that had come from Russia.

2016 December - Far-right politician Geert Wilders is convicted of insulting a group and inciting discrimination for remarks in 2014 promising he would ensure there were fewer Moroccans in the Netherlands, but is not punished.

2017 March - Diplomatic tension between Turkey and the Netherlands, which blocks Turkish ministers from rallying support among Turkish expatriates for constitutional changes ahead of a referendum.

2017 June - A Dutch appeals court partly upholds a 2014 ruling that the Netherlands was liable over the killings of more than 300 Bosnian Muslim men and boys who were sheltering with Dutch UN peacekeepers at Srebrenica in Bosnia in 1995.

2017 October - Prime Minister Mark Rutte forms a coalition after a record 225 days of talks following elections in March.

2018 February - Parliament votes overwhelmingly in favour of recognising the massacres of up to 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman troops in 1915 as genocide.

2021 March - The centre-right VVD party of Prime Minister Mark Rutte is the biggest winner in the elections, securing 35 out of 150 seats. The second biggest party is the centre-left D66 with 24 seats. Geert Wilders' far-right party loses its support. Prime Minister Mark Rutte, in power since 2010, forms his fourth coalition government.