Charles Groenhuijsen
Encyclopedia
Joure
Joure is a town in the Dutch province of Friesland. With 13,000 inhabitants, it is the largest town in the municipality of Skarsterlân.-History:...
, Friesland
Friesland
Friesland is a province in the north of the Netherlands and part of the ancient region of Frisia.Until the end of 1996, the province bore Friesland as its official name. In 1997 this Dutch name lost its official status to the Frisian Fryslân...
) is a Dutch
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
journalist
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
.
For a long time (1986-1989, 1996-2005) Groenhuijsen was a correspondent
Correspondent
A correspondent or on-the-scene reporter is a journalist or commentator, or more general speaking, an agent who contributes reports to a newspaper, or radio or television news, or another type of company, from a remote, often distant, location. A foreign correspondent is stationed in a foreign...
in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
for the main public news program in the Netherlands, the NOS Journaal
Nederlandse Omroep Stichting
The Nederlandse Omroep Stichting , English: Netherlands Broadcasting Foundation, is one of the broadcasters in the Netherlands Public Broadcasting system...
. He was to become the main anchor
Anchor
An anchor is a device, normally made of metal, that is used to connect a vessel to the bed of a body of water to prevent the vessel from drifting due to wind or current. The word derives from Latin ancora, which itself comes from the Greek ἄγκυρα .Anchors can either be temporary or permanent...
of this news broadcast starting in 2006, but his contract was terminated prematurely, because Groenhuijsen made comments characterizing the broadcast as 'leftish' and 'intellectually lazy'. The result of this termination caused Groenhuijsen to be awarded € 489,375 by a Dutch court
Court
A court is a form of tribunal, often a governmental institution, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between parties and carry out the administration of justice in civil, criminal, and administrative matters in accordance with the rule of law...
on 17 February 2006, for breach of contract
Breach of contract
Breach of contract is a legal cause of action in which a binding agreement or bargained-for exchange is not honored by one or more of the parties to the contract by non-performance or interference with the other party's performance....
on part of the NOS.
It was in response to a question by Groenhuijsen at a 2003 press conference that then-U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
Donald Rumsfeld
Donald Henry Rumsfeld is an American politician and businessman. Rumsfeld served as the 13th Secretary of Defense from 1975 to 1977 under President Gerald Ford, and as the 21st Secretary of Defense from 2001 to 2006 under President George W. Bush. He is both the youngest and the oldest person to...
coined the term "Old Europe
Old Europe
Old Europe is a term that was first used by then-U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in January 2003 to refer to European countries that did not support the 2003 invasion of Iraq, specifically France and Germany...
" to describe some of the countries of Western Europe
Western Europe
Western Europe is a loose term for the collection of countries in the western most region of the European continents, though this definition is context-dependent and carries cultural and political connotations. One definition describes Western Europe as a geographic entity—the region lying in the...
.