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138-649: The Bakhuis Mountains ( Dutch : Bakhuisgebergte ) are a mountain range in central Suriname , spanning 110 kilometres. The mountain range form of the northern part of the Wilhelmina Mountains , and the mountains and its village were named after the Dutch explorer and Royal Dutch East Indies Army officer Louis August Bakhuis  [ nl ] . The range lies in the Sipaliwini Savanna District of Suriname. The Bakhuys Airstrip

276-578: A common ancestor with languages such as English, German, and the Scandinavian languages . All Germanic languages are subject to the Grimm's law and Verner's law sound shifts, which originated in the Proto-Germanic language and define the basic features differentiating them from other Indo-European languages. This is assumed to have taken place in approximately the mid-first millennium BCE in

414-759: A constituent country ( Dutch : Land Sint Maarten ) within the Kingdom of the Netherlands, making it a constitutional equal partner with Aruba , Curaçao , and the Netherlands proper. Constitution Day (10 October) is celebrated annually as a public holiday . Sint Maarten has been assigned the ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 country codes of SXM and SX, and the .sx Internet ccTLD became available to register on 15 November 2012. Hurricane Irma made landfall on 6 September 2017, causing extensive damage. Four deaths were ultimately reported, and there were 11 serious injuries out of

552-653: A puppet state under the French Empire until 1815. In the end, the French came out ahead with 53 km (20 sq mi; 61%) against 34 km (13 sq mi; 39%) on the Dutch side. To work the new cotton, tobacco, and sugarcane plantations, the French and Dutch began importing large numbers of African slaves, who soon came to outnumber the Europeans. The slave population quickly grew larger than that of

690-467: A schwa . The Middle Dutch dialect areas were affected by political boundaries. The sphere of political influence of a certain ruler often also created a sphere of linguistic influence, with the language within the area becoming more homogenous. Following the contemporary political divisions they are in order of importance: A process of standardisation started in the Middle Ages , especially under

828-601: A synod taking place in Corbridge , England , where the decisions are being written down " tam Latine quam theodisce " meaning "in Latin as well as common vernacular". According to a hypothesis by De Grauwe, In northern West Francia (i.e. modern-day Belgium) the term would take on a new meaning during the Early Middle Ages , when, within the context of a highly dichromatic linguistic landscape, it came to be

966-459: A tropical savanna climate ( Köppen Aw ), and is drier than most parts of the northeastern Caribbean because of a rain shadow from the island's mountains, drying the trade winds . The driest months are from January to July, and the wettest from September to November, when hurricanes can strike the island. Sint Maarten is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands , and as such

1104-473: A General Measure of Kingdom Administration ( Dutch : Algemene Maatregel van Rijksbestuur ) in early 1993, placing Sint Maarten under direct supervision of the Kingdom. Although originally meant for one year, the Order-in-Council for the Kingdom was eventually extended until 1 March 1996. Though much has changed since, allegations of criminal activities continue to plague Sint Maarten. In 2004,

1242-524: A comparison between the West Germanic languages, see the sections Phonology, Grammar, and Vocabulary. Dutch dialects are primarily the dialects that are both related with the Dutch language and are spoken in the same language area as the Dutch standard language . Although heavily under the influence of the standard language, some of them remain diverse and are found in the Netherlands and in

1380-467: A consequence evolve (along with Alemannic , Bavarian and Lombardic ) into Old High German. At more or less the same time the Ingvaeonic nasal spirant law, moving over Western Europe from west to east, led to the development of Old English (or Anglo-Saxon), Old Frisian and Old Saxon . Hardly influenced by either development, Old Dutch probably remained relatively close to the original language of

1518-433: A loss of the tourist season because of the damage that was done to hotel properties, the negative publicity that one would have that it's better to go somewhere else because it's destroyed. So that will have a serious impact on our economy." At the time, preparations were being made as Hurricane Jose approached the island. The government estimated that on 9 September, 70% of houses were badly damaged or destroyed and much of

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1656-582: A minority language in Germany and northern France's French Flanders . Though Belgium as a whole is multilingual, three of the four language areas into which the country is divided ( Flanders , francophone Wallonia , and the German-speaking Community ) are largely monolingual, with Brussels being bilingual. The Netherlands and Belgium produce the vast majority of music , films , books and other media written or spoken in Dutch. Dutch

1794-670: A minority) and the province of Walloon Brabant . Brabantian expands into small parts in the west of Limburg while its strong influence on the East Flemish of East Flanders and eastern Zeelandic Flanders weakens towards the west. In a small area in the northwest of North Brabant ( Willemstad ), Hollandic is spoken. Conventionally, the Kleverlandish dialects are distinguished from Brabantian, but there are no objective criteria apart from geography to do so. Over 5 million people live in an area with some form of Brabantian being

1932-420: A number of closely related, mutually intelligible dialects spoken in the former Old Dutch area. Where Old Dutch fragments are very hard to read for untrained Modern Dutch speakers, the various literary works of Middle Dutch are somewhat more accessible. The most notable difference between Old and Middle Dutch is in a feature of speech known as vowel reduction , whereby vowels in unstressed syllables are leveled to

2070-579: A political border, because the traditional dialects are strongly influenced by the national standard varieties. While a somewhat heterogeneous group of Low Franconian dialects, Limburgish has received official status as a regional language in the Netherlands and Germany, but not in Belgium. Due to this official recognition, it receives protection by chapter 2 of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages . Afrikaans , although to

2208-413: A result, Nederduits no longer serves as a synonym for the Dutch language. In the 19th century, the term " Diets " was revived by Dutch linguists and historians as well, as a poetic name for Middle Dutch and its literature . Old Dutch can be discerned more or less around the same time as Old English (Anglo-Saxon), Old High German , Old Frisian , and Old Saxon . These names are derived from

2346-509: A result, when West Flemings try to talk Standard Dutch, they are often unable to pronounce the g-sound, and pronounce it similar to the h-sound. This leaves, for example, no difference between " held " (hero) and " geld " (money). Or in some cases, they are aware of the problem, and hyper-correct the "h" into a voiced velar fricative or g-sound, again leaving no difference. The West Flemish variety historically spoken in adjacent parts in France

2484-522: A significant degree mutually intelligible with Dutch, is usually not considered a dialect but instead a separate standardised language . It is spoken in South Africa and Namibia. As a daughter language of 17th-century Dutch dialects, Afrikaans evolved in parallel with modern Dutch, but was influenced by various other languages in South Africa. West Frisian ( Westerlauwers Fries ), along with Saterland Frisian and North Frisian , evolved from

2622-419: A somewhat different development since the late Middle Ages. Two dialect groups have been given the official status of regional language (or streektaal ) in the Netherlands. Like several other dialect groups, both are part of a dialect continuum that continues across the national border. The Dutch Low Saxon dialect area comprises the provinces of Groningen , Drenthe and Overijssel , as well as parts of

2760-424: A source language, mainly for law and history students. In Indonesia this involves about 35,000 students. Unlike other European nations, the Dutch chose not to follow a policy of language expansion amongst the indigenous peoples of their colonies. In the last quarter of the 19th century, however, a local elite gained proficiency in Dutch so as to meet the needs of expanding bureaucracy and business. Nevertheless,

2898-421: A total of 34. Princess Juliana Airport was extensively damaged but reopened on a partial basis in two days to allow incoming relief flights and for flights to take evacuees to other islands. By 8 September, "many inhabitants [were] devoid of basic necessities" and looting had become a serious problem. Reports on 9 September indicated that 70% of the infrastructure on the Dutch part had been destroyed. A survey by

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3036-552: A unique prestige dialect and has a large dialectal continuum consisting of 28 main dialects, which can themselves be further divided into at least 600 distinguishable varieties. In the Netherlands, the Hollandic dialect dominates in national broadcast media while in Flanders Brabantian dialect dominates in that capacity, making them in turn unofficial prestige dialects in their respective countries. Outside

3174-537: Is kantor , handdoek "towel" in Indonesian is handuk , or bushalte "bus stop" in Indonesian is halte bus . In addition, many Indonesian words are calques of Dutch; for example, rumah sakit "hospital" is calqued on the Dutch ziekenhuis (literally "sickhouse"), kebun binatang "zoo" on dierentuin (literally "animal garden"), undang-undang dasar "constitution" from grondwet (literally "ground law"). These account for some of

3312-544: Is Sranan Tongo , spoken natively by about a fifth of the population. Sint Maarten Before 10 October 2010, Sint Maarten was known as the Island Territory of Sint Maarten ( Dutch : Eilandgebied Sint Maarten ), and was one of six (from 1986 five) island territories ( eilandgebieden ) that constituted the Netherlands Antilles . Sint Maarten has the status of an overseas country; it

3450-466: Is a calque of the aforementioned Roman province Germania Inferior and an attempt by early Dutch grammarians to give their language more prestige by linking it to Roman times. Likewise, Hoogduits ("High German") and Overlands ("Upper-landish") came into use as a Dutch exonym for the various German dialects used in neighboring German states. Use of Nederduytsch was popular in the 16th century but ultimately lost out over Nederlands during

3588-544: Is a monocentric language , at least what concerns its written form, with all speakers using the same standard form (authorised by the Dutch Language Union ) based on a Dutch orthography defined in the so-called " Green Booklet " authoritative dictionary and employing the Latin alphabet when writing; however, pronunciation varies between dialects. Indeed, in stark contrast to its written uniformity, Dutch lacks

3726-537: Is also an official language of several international organisations, such as the European Union , Union of South American Nations and the Caribbean Community . At an academic level, Dutch is taught in about 175 universities in 40 countries. About 15,000 students worldwide study Dutch at university. In Europe, Dutch is the majority language in the Netherlands (96%) and Belgium (59%) as well as

3864-579: Is descended from various people groups including Afro-Caribbeans, Europeans, Latin-Americans , Levantine Arabs , East Indians , Jews , South-East Asians and many others. English is the everyday language of communication in Sint Maarten, and the first language of native Sint Maarteners. A local variety of Virgin Islands Creole is spoken in informal situations by Sint Maarteners between themselves. Though it holds official status, Dutch

4002-587: Is found in the Salic law . In this Frankish document written around 510 the oldest Dutch sentence has been identified: Maltho thi afrio lito ("I say to you, I free you, serf") used to free a serf. Another old fragment of Dutch is Visc flot aftar themo uuatare ("A fish was swimming in the water"). The oldest conserved larger Dutch text is the Utrecht baptismal vow (776–800) starting with Forsachistu diobolae ... ec forsacho diabolae (litt.: "Forsake you

4140-429: Is home to many distinctive plants such as hibiscus , yellow sage (seen on the flag), flamboyant trees , mahogany, and cacti. An estimated 522 wild plants are present, mainly being seed plants and a few ferns. The Calyptranthes boldinghgii and Galactia nummelaria are “ island-endemic ”, and it is suspected that they have already gone extinct. Much of the hilltops are semi-evergreen seasonal forests which are rare in

4278-471: Is mostly Germanic; it incorporates slightly more Romance loans than German, but far fewer than English. In Belgium, the Netherlands and Suriname, the native official name for Dutch is Nederlands (historically Nederlandsch before the Dutch orthographic reforms ). Sometimes Vlaams (" Flemish ") is used as well to describe Standard Dutch in Flanders , whereas Hollands (" Hollandic ")

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4416-587: Is near the village. The Bakhuis Mountains have rich deposits of bauxite , as well as nickel and copper . In 1974, a new mineral named surinamite  [ nl ] ((Mg, Fe) 3 Al 4 BeSi 3 O 16 ) was found in the mountain range. The Bakhuis mountain range is an area of 2800 km² and contains a large concession area for mining bauxite, in which both the Surinamese company Suralco  [ nl ] and foreign exploitation companies are interested. Ecologists fear destruction of jungle area when

4554-517: Is not part of the European Union , but is a member of the Overseas Countries and Territories Association . On 6 and 7 September 2017, the island was hit by Category 5 Hurricane Irma , which caused widespread and significant damage to buildings and infrastructure. Due to confusion on early maps, the island accidentally got the name Christopher Columbus had given in honor of Saint Martin of Tours , when he first sighted Nevis on

4692-487: Is occasionally used as a colloquial term for the standard language in the central and northwestern parts of the Netherlands. English uses the adjective Dutch as a noun for the language of the Netherlands and Flanders. The word is derived from Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz . The stem of this word, *þeudō , meant "people" in Proto-Germanic, and *-iskaz was an adjective-forming suffix, of which -ish

4830-569: Is so distinct that it might be considered as a separate language variant, although the strong significance of language in Belgian politics would prevent the government from classifying them as such. An oddity of the dialect is that, the voiced velar fricative (written as "g" in Dutch) shifts to a voiced glottal fricative (written as "h" in Dutch), while the letter "h" becomes mute (like in French). As

4968-585: Is sometimes called French Flemish and is listed as a French minority language . However, only a very small and aging minority of the French-Flemish population still speaks and understands West Flemish. Hollandic is spoken in Holland and Utrecht , though the original forms of this dialect (which were heavily influenced by a West Frisian substratum and, from the 16th century on, by Brabantian dialects ) are now relatively rare. The urban dialects of

5106-637: Is spoken in Limburg (Belgium) as well as in the remaining part of Limburg (Netherlands) and extends across the German border. West Flemish ( Westvlaams ) is spoken in West Flanders , the western part of Zeelandic Flanders and also in French Flanders , where it virtually became extinct to make way for French. The West Flemish group of dialects, spoken in West Flanders and Zeeland ,

5244-595: Is taught in various educational centres in Indonesia, the most important of which is the Erasmus Language Centre (ETC) in Jakarta . Each year, some 1,500 to 2,000 students take Dutch courses there. In total, several thousand Indonesians study Dutch as a foreign language. Owing to centuries of Dutch rule in Indonesia, many old documents are written in Dutch. Many universities therefore include Dutch as

5382-662: Is the Modern English form. Theodiscus was its Latinised form and used as an adjective referring to the Germanic vernaculars of the Early Middle Ages . In this sense, it meant "the language of the common people". The term was used as opposed to Latin , the non -native language of writing and the Catholic Church . It was first recorded in 786, when the Bishop of Ostia writes to Pope Adrian I about

5520-404: Is the case with the ( standardised ) West Frisian language . It is spoken alongside Dutch in the province of Friesland . Dutch dialects and regional languages are not spoken as often as they used to be, especially in the Netherlands. Recent research by Geert Driessen shows that the use of dialects and regional languages among both Dutch adults and youth is in heavy decline. In 1995, 27 percent of

5658-448: Is the native language of the majority of the population of Suriname , and spoken as a second or third language in the polyglot Caribbean island countries of Aruba , Curaçao and Sint Maarten . All these countries have recognised Dutch as one of their official languages, and are involved in one way or another in the Dutch Language Union . The Dutch Caribbean municipalities ( St. Eustatius , Saba and Bonaire ) have Dutch as one of

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5796-530: Is the sole official language, and over 60 percent of the population speaks it as a mother tongue . Dutch is the obligatory medium of instruction in schools in Suriname, even for non-native speakers. A further twenty-four percent of the population speaks Dutch as a second language . Suriname gained its independence from the Netherlands in 1975 and has been an associate member of the Dutch Language Union since 2004. The lingua franca of Suriname, however,

5934-531: The 2006 New Zealand census , 26,982 people, or 0.70 percent of the total population, reported to speak Dutch to sufficient fluency that they could hold an everyday conversation. In contrast to the colonies in the East Indies , from the second half of the 19th century onwards, the Netherlands envisaged the expansion of Dutch in its colonies in the West Indies . Until 1863, when slavery was abolished in

6072-578: The Bergakker inscription , found near the Dutch city of Tiel , which may represent a primary record of 5th-century Frankish. Although some place names recorded in Roman texts such as vadam (modern Dutch: wad , English: "mudflat"), could arguably be considered as the oldest single "Dutch" words, the Bergakker inscription yields the oldest evidence of Dutch morphology. However, interpretations of

6210-455: The Brussels and Flemish regions of Belgium . The areas in which they are spoken often correspond with former medieval counties and duchies. The Netherlands (but not Belgium) distinguishes between a dialect and a streektaal (" regional language "). Those words are actually more political than linguistic because a regional language unites a large group of very different varieties. Such is

6348-639: The Dutch Caribbean Coast Guard , directed by the commander of the Royal Netherlands Navy in the Caribbean, operates throughout the Caribbean and is funded by the four constituent countries of the Kingdom. The beach policy (as of 1994) views the beach from the perspective of being an ecosystem service for recreational activities. This is because the economy on Sint Maarten is tourism-driven, and many tourists come to

6486-574: The Dutch West India Company began mining salt on the island. Tensions between the Netherlands and Spain were already high due to the ongoing Eighty Years' War , and in 1633 the Spanish captured St Martin and drove off the Dutch colonists. At Point Blanche, they built what is now Old Spanish Fort to secure the territory. The Dutch under Peter Stuyvesant attempted to wrest back control in 1644, but were repulsed. However, in 1648

6624-481: The Estates of Sint Maarten on 10 October. Sint Maarten is largely autonomous in internal affairs, with the Netherlands responsible for foreign diplomacy and defence. The first woman to be the president of Sint Maarten was Gracita Arrindell , who was first elected in 2010. There currently is a movement in Sint Maarten aiming for the unification of island of Saint Martin , which has its own flag. The Kingdom of

6762-571: The Franco-Dutch treaty on Saint Martin border controls , which allows for joint Franco-Dutch border controls on so-called "risk flights". After some delay, the treaty was ratified in November 2006 in the Netherlands and subsequently entered into force on 1 August 2007. Though the treaty is now in force, its provisions are not yet implemented as the working group specified in the treaty is not yet installed. On 10 October 2010 Sint Maarten became

6900-554: The High German consonant shift , does not use Germanic umlaut as a grammatical marker, has largely abandoned the use of the subjunctive , and has levelled much of its morphology , including most of its case system . Features shared with German, however, include the survival of two to three grammatical genders  – albeit with few grammatical consequences  – as well as the use of modal particles , final-obstruent devoicing , and (similar) word order . Dutch vocabulary

7038-618: The Island Regulation of the Netherlands Antilles . During this period Sint Maarten was ruled by an island council, an executive council, and a lieutenant governor ( Dutch : gezaghebber ) appointed by the Dutch Crown. Hurricane Luis in late August and early September 1995 hit the island, causing immense destruction and resulting in 12 deaths. In 1994, the Kingdom of the Netherlands and France had signed

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7176-631: The Leeward Islands ; the northern half forms the French territory of Saint Martin . To the north across the Anguilla Channel lies the British Overseas Territory of Anguilla , to the south-east of the island lies the French island of Saint Barthélemy , and further south are the Dutch islands of Saba and Saint Eustatius . Sint Maarten is 34 km (13 sq mi). The terrain is generally hilly, with

7314-493: The Low Countries , its meaning being largely implicitly provided by the regional orientation of medieval Dutch society: apart from the higher echelons of the clergy and nobility, mobility was largely static and hence while "Dutch" could by extension also be used in its earlier sense, referring to what today would be called Germanic dialects as opposed to Romance dialects , in many cases it was understood or meant to refer to

7452-591: The Low Franconian languages, paired with its sister language Limburgish or East Low Franconian. Its closest relative is the mutually intelligible daughter language Afrikaans. Other West Germanic languages related to Dutch are German , English and the un-standardised languages Low German and Yiddish . Dutch stands out in combining some Ingvaeonic characteristics (occurring consistently in English and Frisian and reduced in intensity from west to east over

7590-531: The Randstad , which are Hollandic dialects, do not diverge from standard Dutch very much, but there is a clear difference between the city dialects of Rotterdam , The Hague , Amsterdam and Utrecht . In some rural Hollandic areas more authentic Hollandic dialects are still being used, especially north of Amsterdam. Another group of dialects based on Hollandic is that spoken in the cities and larger towns of Friesland , where it partially displaced West Frisian in

7728-543: The Southern Netherlands (now Belgium and Luxembourg), developments were different. Under subsequent Spanish , Austrian and French rule , the standardisation of Dutch language came to a standstill. The state, law, and increasingly education used French, yet more than half the Belgian population were speaking a variety of Dutch. In the course of the 19th century, the Flemish Movement stood up for

7866-508: The Treaty of Concordia in 1648, which divided the island in two. During the treaty's negotiation, the French had a fleet of naval ships off shore, which they used as a threat to bargain more land for themselves. In spite of the treaty, relations between the two sides were not always cordial. Between 1648 and 1816, conflicts changed the border sixteen times. The entire island came under effective French control from 1795 when Netherlands became

8004-497: The antonym of *walhisk (Romance-speakers, specifically Old French ). The word, now rendered as dietsc (Southwestern variant) or duutsc (Central and Northern Variant), could refer to the Dutch language itself, as well as a broader Germanic category depending on context. During the High Middle Ages " Dietsc / Duutsc " was increasingly used as an umbrella term for the specific Germanic dialects spoken in

8142-471: The continental West Germanic plane) with dominant Istvaeonic characteristics, some of which are also incorporated in German. Unlike German, Dutch (apart from Limburgish) has not been influenced at all by the south to north movement of the High German consonant shift and had some changes of its own. The cumulation of these changes resulted over time in separate, but related standard languages with various degrees of similarities and differences between them. For

8280-434: The differences in vocabulary between Indonesian and Malay. Some regional languages in Indonesia have some Dutch loanwords as well; for example, Sundanese word Katel or "frying pan" origin in Dutch is " ketel ". The Javanese word for "bike/ bicycle " " pit " can be traced back to its origin in Dutch " fiets ". The Malacca state of Malaysia was also colonized by the Dutch in its longest period that Malacca

8418-483: The monarch of the Netherlands is head of state, represented locally by a governor . Following the dissolution of the Netherlands Antilles , the Constitution of Sint Maarten was unanimously adopted by the island council of Sint Maarten on 21 July 2010. Elections for a new island council were held on 17 September 2010 , since the number of seats was increased from 11 to 15. The newly elected island council became

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8556-642: The pre-Roman Northern European Iron Age . The Germanic languages are traditionally divided into three groups: East (now extinct), West , and North Germanic. They remained mutually intelligible throughout the Migration Period . Dutch is part of the West Germanic group, which also includes English, Scots , Frisian , Low German (Old Saxon) and High German . It is characterised by a number of phonological and morphological innovations not found in North or East Germanic. The West Germanic varieties of

8694-518: The 14th to 15th century onward, its urban centers ( Deventer , Zwolle , Kampen , Zutphen and Doesburg ) have been increasingly influenced by the western written Dutch and became a linguistically mixed area. From the 17th century onward, it was gradually integrated into the Dutch language area. Dutch Low Saxon used to be at one end of the Low German dialect continuum . However, the national border has given way to dialect boundaries coinciding with

8832-538: The 16th century and is known as Stadsfries ("Urban Frisian"). Hollandic together with inter alia Kleverlandish and North Brabantian , but without Stadsfries, are the Central Dutch dialects . Brabantian is named after the historical Duchy of Brabant , which corresponded mainly to the provinces of North Brabant and southern Gelderland , the Belgian provinces of Antwerp and Flemish Brabant , as well as Brussels (where its native speakers have become

8970-462: The 2011 Netherlands Antilles census, the population of the island territory was 33,609. In the 2017 census the total population of the country was 40,535. In 2023 a total of 58,477 persons had been registered in the country’s Department of Civil Registry. Sint Maarten is one of the most international and diverse islands of the Caribbean. With over 120+ nationalities, and 2/3 of Sint Maarten's population being foreign born. Sint Maarten's population

9108-688: The 7th century. It was replaced in France by Old French (a Romance language with a considerable Old Frankish influence). However, the Old Franconian language did not die out at large, as it continued to be spoken in the Low Countries, and subsequently evolved into what is now called Old Low Franconian or Old Dutch in the Low Countries. In fact, Old Frankish could be reconstructed from Old Dutch and Frankish loanwords in Old French. The term Old Dutch or Old Low Franconian refers to

9246-431: The Atlantic . Tourism began growing from the 1950s onward, and Princess Juliana International Airport became one of the busiest in the Eastern Caribbean. For much of this period, Sint Maarten was governed by business tycoon Claude Wathey of the Democratic Party . The island's demographics changed dramatically during this period as well, with the population increasing from a mere 5,000 people to around 60,000 people by

9384-485: The Dutch Red Cross estimated that nearly a third of the buildings in Sint Maarten had been destroyed and that over 90% of structures on the island had been damaged. The prime minister of the Netherlands, Mark Rutte , told the news media on 8 September that the airport in Sint Maarten was ready to receive emergency flights and that aid, as well as police officers and military personnel, were on their way. The prime minister of Sint Maarten, William Marlin , had already asked

9522-417: The Dutch adult population spoke a dialect or regional language on a regular basis, but in 2011, that was no more than 11 percent. In 1995, 12 percent of children of primary school age spoke a dialect or regional language, but in 2011, that had declined to four percent. Of the officially recognised regional languages Limburgish is spoken the most (in 2011 among adults 54%, among children 31%) and Dutch Low Saxon

9660-453: The Dutch government for extended relief assistance which began to arrive on 8 September. The government issued a tropical storm warning on 8 September since the category four Hurricane Jose was approaching. In the aftermath of the hurricane, the extensive damage led officials to predict dramatic economic impacts. A statement by Marlin summarized the situation on 8 September: "We've lost many, many homes. Schools have been destroyed. We foresee

9798-409: The Dutch government remained reluctant to teach Dutch on a large scale for fear of destabilising the colony. Dutch, the language of power, was supposed to remain in the hands of the leading elite. After independence, Dutch was dropped as an official language and replaced by Indonesian , but this does not mean that Dutch has completely disappeared in Indonesia: Indonesian Dutch , a regional variety of

9936-415: The Dutch standard language is largely absent, and speakers of these Dutch dialects will use German or French in everyday speech. Dutch is not afforded legal status in France or Germany, either by the central or regional public authorities, and knowledge of the language is declining among younger generations. As a foreign language , Dutch is mainly taught in primary and secondary schools in areas adjacent to

10074-531: The Dutch standard language, it is not mutually intelligible with Dutch and considered a sister language of Dutch, like English and German. Approximate distribution of native Dutch speakers worldwide: Dutch is an official language of the Netherlands proper (not enshrined in the constitution but in administrative law ), Belgium, Suriname, the Dutch Caribbean municipalities (St. Eustatius, Saba and Bonaire), Aruba , Curaçao and Sint Maarten . Dutch

10212-408: The Dutch, was still spoken by about 500,000 half-blood in Indonesia in 1985. Yet the Indonesian language inherited many words from Dutch: words for everyday life as well as scientific and technological terms. One scholar argues that 20% of Indonesian words can be traced back to Dutch words, many of which are transliterated to reflect phonetic pronunciation e.g. kantoor "office" in Indonesian

10350-522: The Eighty Years' War ended and the Spanish, no longer seeing any strategic or economic value in the island, simply abandoned it. With Saint Martin free again, both the Dutch and the French jumped at the chance to re-establish their settlements. Dutch colonists came from St. Eustatius , while the French came from St. Kitts . After some initial conflict, both sides realized that neither would yield easily. Preferring to avoid an all-out war, they signed

10488-602: The Franks. However, the language did experience developments of its own, such as very early final-obstruent devoicing . In fact, the find at Bergakker indicates that the language may already have experienced this shift during the Old Frankish period. Attestations of Old Dutch sentences are extremely rare. The language is mostly recorded on fragmentary relics, and words have been reconstructed from Middle Dutch and loan words from Old Dutch in other languages. The oldest recorded

10626-599: The Minister of Justice of the Netherlands Antilles asked the Scientific Research and Documentation Centre ( Dutch : Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek- en Documentatiecentrum (WODC)) of the Dutch Ministry of Justice to conduct research into organized crime in Sint Maarten. The report concluded that money laundering and cocaine trade are widespread on Sint Maarten. It also alleged that money from the island

10764-576: The Netherlands and Flanders . In French-speaking Belgium , over 300,000 pupils are enrolled in Dutch courses, followed by over 23,000 in the German states of Lower Saxony and North Rhine-Westphalia , and about 7,000 in the French region of Nord-Pas-de-Calais (of which 4,550 are in primary school). At an academic level, the largest number of faculties of neerlandistiek can be found in Germany (30 universities), followed by France (20 universities) and

10902-412: The Netherlands and Belgium, the dialect spoken in and around the German town of Kleve ( Kleverlandish ) is historically and genetically a Low Franconian variety. In North-Western France, the area around Calais was historically Dutch-speaking (West Flemish), of which an estimated 20,000 are daily speakers. The cities of Dunkirk , Gravelines and Bourbourg only became predominantly French-speaking by

11040-632: The Netherlands has overarching responsibility for foreign relations, defence and Dutch nationality law in the Caribbean parts of the Kingdom. A detachment of the Royal Netherlands Marine Corps is present on Sint Maarten and the Royal Netherlands Navy deploys a guardship, normally a Holland -class offshore patrol vessel , in the Caribbean on a rotational basis together with the support vessel HNLMS  Pelikaan which operates out of Curacao. Additionally,

11178-539: The Netherlands, although there are recognisable differences in pronunciation, comparable to the pronunciation differences between standard British and standard American English. In 1980 the Netherlands and Belgium concluded the Language Union Treaty . This treaty lays down the principle that the two countries must gear their language policy to each other, among other things, for a common system of spelling. Dutch belongs to its own West Germanic sub-group,

11316-481: The US, Canada, and Europe. A new departure lounge was being used during rebuilding of the original facility. The General Aviation building was being used for passengers arriving on the island. A little over a year after Hurricane Irma, St Maarten's cruise industry had recovered to the extent that in 2018, more than 1 million cruise passengers visited the island. Telecommunications, including Wi-Fi, had been restored on

11454-674: The United Kingdom (5 universities). Despite the Dutch presence in Indonesia for almost 350 years, as the Asian bulk of the Dutch East Indies , the Dutch language has no official status there and the small minority that can speak the language fluently are either educated members of the oldest generation, or employed in the legal profession such as historians, diplomats, lawyers, jurists and linguists/polyglots, as certain law codes are still only available in Dutch. Dutch

11592-621: The West Indies, slaves were forbidden to speak Dutch, with the effect that local creoles such as Papiamento and Sranan Tongo which were based not on Dutch but rather other European languages, became common in the Dutch West Indies. However, as most of the people in the Colony of Surinam (now Suriname ) worked on Dutch plantations, this reinforced the use of Dutch as a means for direct communication. In Suriname today, Dutch

11730-661: The area known as the Low Countries goes back further in time, with the Romans referring to the region as Germania Inferior ("Lower" Germania). It is a reference to the Low Countries' downriver location at the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta near the North Sea . From 1551, the designation Nederlands received strong competition from the name Nederduytsch (literally "Low Dutch", Dutch being used in its archaic sense covering all continental West Germanic languages). It

11868-511: The beach line, or preserving the plants that live in and along the beach line. The hillside policy, as of 1998, is mainly concerned with residential development. On the hillside, only residential development is permitted, certain hillsides with important “visual impact” are protected and conserved for their general landscape. A natural park is projected for the following hills: Cole Bay Hill, Sentry Hill, St. Peters Hill, Concordia Hill, Marigot Hill, Waymouth Hill, and Williams Hill. The policy stated

12006-624: The borders of other standard language areas. In most cases, the heavy influence of the standard language has broken the dialect continuum . Examples are the Gronings dialect spoken in Groningen as well as the closely related varieties in adjacent East Frisia (Germany). Kleverlandish is a dialect spoken in southern Gelderland , the northern tip of Limburg , and northeast of North Brabant (Netherlands), but also in adjacent parts of North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany). Limburgish ( Limburgs )

12144-479: The case with the Gronings dialect , which is considered a variety of the Dutch Low Saxon regional language, but it is relatively distinct from other Dutch Low Saxon varieties. Also, some Dutch dialects are more remote from the Dutch standard language than some varieties of a regional language are. Within the Netherlands, a further distinction is made between a regional language and a separate language, which

12282-553: The close of the 18th century, with (Hoog)Duytsch establishing itself as the Dutch exonym for German during this same period. In the 19th century Germany saw the rise of the categorisation of dialects, with German dialectologists terming the German dialects spoken in the mountainous south of Germany as Hochdeutsch ("High German"). Subsequently, German dialects spoken in the north were designated as Niederdeutsch ("Low German"). The names for these dialects were calqued by Dutch linguists as Nederduits and Hoogduits . As

12420-562: The company was sending its Adventure of the Seas to Sint Maarten and to St. Thomas to provide supplies and to offer evacuation services. The ship arrived on the island on 10 September with water, ice, garbage bags, clothing, and canned food, and evacuated 320 people. By 11 September, King Willem-Alexander had already arrived in Curaçao and was scheduled to visit Sint Maarten, St. Eustatius, and Saba. When Willem-Alexander visited Sint Maarten for

12558-413: The course of fifteen centuries. During that period, they forced Old Frisian back from the western coast to the north of the Low Countries, and influenced or even replaced Old Saxon spoken in the east (contiguous with the Low German area). On the other hand, Dutch has been replaced in adjacent lands in present-day France and Germany. The division into Old, Middle and Modern Dutch is mostly conventional, since

12696-540: The declaration of independence of Indonesia, Western New Guinea , the "wild east" of the Dutch East Indies , remained a Dutch colony until 1962, known as Netherlands New Guinea . Despite prolonged Dutch presence, the Dutch language is not spoken by many Papuans, the colony having been ceded to Indonesia in 1963. Dutch-speaking immigrant communities can also be found in Australia and New Zealand. The 2011 Australian census showed 37,248 people speaking Dutch at home. At

12834-603: The development of a separate Dutch language. It was spoken by the descendants of the Salian Franks who occupied what is now the southern Netherlands , northern Belgium , part of northern France, and parts of the Lower Rhine regions of Germany. The High German consonant shift, moving over Western Europe from south to west, caused a differentiation with the Central and High Franconian in Germany. The latter would as

12972-474: The devil? ... I forsake the devil"). If only for its poetic content, the most famous Old Dutch sentence is probably Hebban olla vogala nestas hagunnan, hinase hic enda tu, wat unbidan we nu ("All birds have started making nests, except me and you, what are we waiting for"), is dated to around the year 1100, written by a Flemish monk in a convent in Rochester , England . Since the sentence speaks to

13110-489: The end of the 19th century. In the countryside, until World War I , many elementary schools continued to teach in Dutch, and the Catholic Church continued to preach and teach the catechism in Dutch in many parishes. During the second half of the 19th century, Dutch was banned from all levels of education by both Prussia and France and lost most of its functions as a cultural language. In both Germany and France,

13248-466: The feast day of Saint Martin. The confusion of numerous poorly charted small islands in the Leeward Islands meant that this name was accidentally transferred to the island now known as Saint-Martin/Sint Maarten. Nominally Spanish territory, the island became the focus of the competing interests of the European powers, notably France , Britain, and the Netherlands. While the French wanted to colonize

13386-529: The first time post-hurricane, he was shocked by the destruction. He immediately called for support from the European Union so the island could recover swiftly. Later in the month, it was revealed that the EU would allocate €2 billion in emergency funds for immediate disaster relief to restore basic essentials on Sint Maarten, such as drinking water and sanitation. In addition to the EU's contribution, Red Cross,

13524-403: The government of the Netherlands, and Dutch citizens of the mainland raised money via donations and crowdfunding for the recovery efforts. On 10 October 2017, Princess Juliana International Airport re-commenced commercial flights using temporary structures, pending repairs. A report in late March 2018 indicated that the airport was able to handle some flights and some service had resumed from

13662-571: The highest peak being Mount Flagstaff at 383m, which lies directly on the island's international border. The area to the west around the airport is flatter, and contains the Dutch section of the Simpson Bay Lagoon . The Great Salt Pond lies to north of Philipsburg. Several small islands lie off the coast. Little Key lies in the Simpson Bay Lagoon. There are ten total islands in Sint Maarten, including: Sint Maarten has

13800-415: The imagination, it is often erroneously stated as the oldest Dutch sentence. Old Dutch naturally evolved into Middle Dutch . The year 1150 is often cited as the time of the discontinuity, but it actually marks a time of profuse Dutch writing; during this period a rich Medieval Dutch literature developed. There was at that time no overarching standard language ; Middle Dutch is rather a collective name for

13938-656: The influence of the Burgundian Ducal Court in Dijon ( Brussels after 1477). The dialects of Flanders and Brabant were the most influential around this time. The process of standardisation became much stronger at the start of the 16th century, mainly based on the urban dialect of Antwerp . The 1585 fall of Antwerp to the Spanish army led to a flight to the northern Netherlands, where the Dutch Republic declared its independence from Spain. This influenced

14076-417: The invasive species on the island is crowfoot grass ( Dactyloctenium aegyptium ). Mullet Pond, a section of the inland lagoon Simpson Bay Lagoon , is home to 70% of Sint Maarten's mangrove population on the Dutch side of the island. Mangroves are a nursery for many young fish and during hurricane season they provide coastal protection. The area, however, is at risk due to dredging, tourism activities, and

14214-611: The island government of Sint Maarten and the Sicilian Mafia , and in 1991 the Court of Audit of the Netherlands Antilles issued a report which concluded that the island government of Sint Maarten was ailing. In the government and parliament of the Netherlands, the call for measures became louder. With Dutch pressure, the government of the Netherlands Antilles installed the Pourier Commission tasked with investigating

14352-508: The island to enjoy the 37 beaches on the island. The policy has three main points: the beach must be usable for everyone, developments negatively affecting recreational use will be prevented, and beaches should be protected against human influences that could impair their recreational function. The policy's main purpose is to protect the recreational value of the beach. The laws do not consider the protection and ecological value of this habitat in regard to protecting nesting sea turtles , preserving

14490-411: The island, 95% of customers were receiving electricity and drinking water was readily available on the island. Some tourist accommodations were open, with 27 operating and 36 said to be ready sometime later this year. Cruise ships were arriving; a full 14 were accommodated the week of 18 February 2018. Download coordinates as: Sint Maarten occupies the southern part of the island of Saint Martin in

14628-560: The islands between Trinidad and Bermuda , the Dutch found San Martín a convenient halfway point between their colonies in New Amsterdam (present day New York ) and New Holland . Meanwhile, the Amerindian population began to decline precipitously, dying from introduced diseases to which they had no immunity. The Dutch built a fort ( Fort Amsterdam ) on the island in 1631; Jan Claeszen van Campen became its first governor and

14766-433: The land owners. Subjected to cruel treatment, slaves staged rebellions, and their overwhelming numbers made it impossible to ignore their concerns. In 1848, the French abolished slavery in their colonies including the French side of St. Martin. Slaves on the Dutch side of the island protested and threatened to flee to the French side to seek asylum. The local Dutch authorities then freed the colonies' slaves. While this decree

14904-563: The language now known as Dutch. In the Low Countries Dietsch or its Early Modern Dutch form Duytsch as an endonym for Dutch gradually went out of common use and was gradually replaced by the Dutch endonym Nederlands . This designation (first attested in 1482) started at the Burgundian court in the 15th century, although the use of neder , laag , bas , and inferior ("nether" or "low") to refer to

15042-629: The least (adults 15%, children 1%). The decline of the West Frisian language in Friesland occupies a middle position (adults 44%, children 22%). Dialects are most often spoken in rural areas, but many cities have a distinct city dialect. For example, the city of Ghent has very distinct "g", "e" and "r" sounds that greatly differ from its surrounding villages. The Brussels dialect combines Brabantian with words adopted from Walloon and French . Some dialects had, until recently, extensions across

15180-494: The main objective was to conserve and maintain the green hillside and restore any natural habitats if needed. However, as of 2020, these natural parks had not yet been established. In 1978, the government of the Netherlands Antilles installed a Research Committee on the Windward Islands ( Dutch : Commissie van Onderzoek Bovenwindse Eilanden ) to investigate claims of corruption in the island government. Even though

15318-712: The mid-1990s. Immigration from the neighbouring Lesser Antilles, Curaçao , Haiti , the Dominican Republic , the United States, Europe, and Asia turned the native population into a minority. Sint Maarten became an "island territory" ( eilandgebied in Dutch ) of the Netherlands Antilles in 1983. Before that date, Sint Maarten was part of the island territory of the Windward Islands, together with Saba and Sint Eustatius . The status of an island territory entails considerable autonomy summed up in

15456-410: The mining commences. The mountains vary in height from 300–946 m (984–3,104 ft), and are covered with largely pristine forest. The range has been designated an Important Bird Area (IBA) by BirdLife International because it supports significant populations of many birds, including the near-threatened crested eagle , harpy eagle and blue-cheeked parrot , among 378 species recorded. In

15594-437: The modern standard languages . In this age no standard languages had yet developed, while a perfect West Germanic dialect continuum remained present; the division reflects the contingent future contribution dialect groups would have to the later languages. The early form of Dutch was a set of Franconian dialects spoken by the Salian Franks in the 5th century. These happened to develop through Middle Dutch to Modern Dutch over

15732-501: The official languages. In Asia, Dutch was used in the Dutch East Indies (now mostly Indonesia ) by a limited educated elite of around 2% of the total population, including over 1 million indigenous Indonesians, until it was banned in 1957, but the ban was lifted afterwards. About a fifth of the Indonesian language can be traced to Dutch, including many loan words . Indonesia's Civil Code has not been officially translated, and

15870-470: The original Dutch language version dating from colonial times remains the authoritative version. Up to half a million native speakers reside in the United States, Canada and Australia combined, and historical linguistic minorities on the verge of extinction remain in parts of France and Germany. Dutch is one of the closest relatives of both German and English, and is colloquially said to be "roughly in between" them. Dutch, like English, has not undergone

16008-456: The period 800 BC – 300 BC. Circa 1300-1400 AD they began to be displaced with the arrival of the Kalinago people. It is commonly believed that Christopher Columbus named the island in honor of Saint Martin of Tours when he encountered it on his second voyage of discovery. However, he actually applied the name to the island now called Nevis when he anchored offshore on 11 November 1493,

16146-598: The population of the Netherlands and Flanders (which includes 60% of the population of Belgium ). Dutch was one of the official languages of South Africa until 1925, when it was replaced by Afrikaans , a separate but partially mutually intelligible daughter language of Dutch. Afrikaans, depending on the definition used, may be considered a sister language , spoken, to some degree, by at least 16 million people, mainly in South Africa and Namibia , and evolving from Cape Dutch dialects. In South America, it

16284-571: The population was living in shelters ahead of the arrival of Jose. Fortunately, this second hurricane did not have a significant impact on the island. Widespread looting and violence erupted in the wake of the recovery, and a state of emergency was announced. Two hundred and thirty soldiers from the Netherlands were sent in to stabilize the situation, with additional troops arriving in the coming days. By 10 September, approximately 1,200 Americans had been evacuated to Puerto Rico by military aircraft. On that date, Royal Caribbean International said that

16422-527: The predominant colloquial language out of the area's 22 million Dutch-speakers. Limburgish , spoken in both Belgian Limburg and Netherlands Limburg and in adjacent parts in Germany, is considered a dialect in Belgium, while having obtained the official status of regional language in the Netherlands. Limburgish has been influenced by the Ripuarian varieties like the Colognian dialect , and has had

16560-411: The provinces of Gelderland , Flevoland , Friesland and Utrecht . This group, which is not Low Franconian but instead Low Saxon and close to neighbouring Low German, has been elevated by the Netherlands (and by Germany) to the legal status of streektaal ( regional language ) according to the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages . It is regarded as Dutch for a number of reasons. From

16698-488: The railway line was never put into use and was abandoned in 2002. Dutch language Dutch ( endonym : Nederlands [ˈneːdərlɑnts] ) is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family , spoken by about 25 million people as a first language and 5 million as a second language and is the third most spoken Germanic language. In Europe, Dutch is the native language of most of

16836-598: The region. The categorization of native, introduced, and invasive plant species is not as well documented for the island. Some of the introduced plant species include: manila grass ( Zoysia matrella ), Spanish bayonet ( Y ucca aloifolia ), Singapore almond ( Terminalia catappa ), true aloe ( Aloe vera ). Some of the native species are west Indian holly ( Tunera ulmifolia ), spiny amaranth ( Amaranthus spinosus ), bell pepper (C apsium pulcherrima ), salt heliotrope ( Heliotropium curassavicum ), bay rum tree ( pimento racemose ), and sourbush ( pluchea carolinesis ). One of

16974-411: The report issued by this commission was damaging for the island's government, measures were not put into place to curb corruption, arguably because the government of the Netherlands Antilles depended on the support of Wathey's Democratic Party in the Estates of the Netherlands Antilles . In August 1990, the public prosecutor of the Netherlands Antilles started an investigation into the alleged ties between

17112-515: The rest of the text lack any consensus. The Franks emerged in the southern Netherlands ( Salian Franks ) and central Germany ( Ripuarian Franks ), and later descended into Gaul . The name of their kingdom survives in that of France. Although they ruled the Gallo-Romans for nearly 300 years, their language, Frankish , became extinct in most of France and was replaced by later forms of the language throughout Luxembourg and Germany in around

17250-423: The rights of Dutch speakers, mostly referred to as "Flemish". However, the dialect variation was a serious disadvantage in the face of the standardised francophony . Since standardisation is a lengthy process, Dutch-speaking Belgium associated itself with the standard language that had already developed in the Netherlands over the centuries. Therefore, the situation in Belgium is essentially no different from that in

17388-519: The saint's feast day on 11 November 1493. "Sint Maarten" is Saint Martin in Dutch. Sint Maarten had been inhabited by the Amerindian peoples for many centuries, with archaeological finds pointing to a human presence on the island as early as 2000 BC. These people most likely migrated from South America. The earliest identified group were the Arawak people who are thought to have settled around

17526-524: The same branch of the West Germanic languages as Old English (i.e. Anglo-Frisian ) and are therefore genetically more closely related to English and Scots than to Dutch. The different influences on the respective languages, however, particularly that of Norman French on English and Dutch on West Frisian, have rendered English quite distinct from West Frisian, and West Frisian less distinct from Dutch than from English. Although under heavy influence of

17664-418: The sea grass beds were much larger. Natural disasters (hurricanes), development, and the tourist industry caused a significant decrease over the years. The seagrass beds are important for anchoring the sand in place, as well as for hurricane protection. Without the seagrass bed, sand can be moved easily by a hurricane, resulting in the loss of beaches or sand accumulates in one area, affecting marine life. In

17802-547: The second half of the 20th century there was already a plan to economically exploit the area: the West Suriname Plan , centred on the mining of bauxite in the Bakhuis Mountains. After Suriname became independent of the Netherlands in the 1980s, however, the implementation of this plan was discontinued. A specially built railway line was built in 1972, connecting the Bakhuis Mountains with Apoera , however

17940-402: The set of Franconian dialects (i.e. West Germanic varieties that are assumed to have evolved from Frankish ) spoken in the Low Countries during the Early Middle Ages , from around the 5th to the 12th century. Old Dutch is mostly recorded on fragmentary relics, and words have been reconstructed from Middle Dutch and Old Dutch loanwords in French. Old Dutch is regarded as the primary stage in

18078-465: The state of affairs of the island government of Sint Maarten in December 1991. Its report concluded that the island was in a severe financial crisis, that rules of democratic decision-making were continuously broken, and that the island government constituted an oligarchy . In short, the island government failed completely according to the report. After long negotiations, the Kingdom government enacted

18216-545: The time are generally split into three dialect groups: Ingvaeonic (North Sea Germanic), Istvaeonic (Weser–Rhine Germanic) and Irminonic (Elbe Germanic). It appears that the Frankish tribes fit primarily into the Istvaeonic dialect group with certain Ingvaeonic influences towards the northwest, which are still seen in modern Dutch. The Frankish language itself is not directly attested, the only possible exception being

18354-466: The transition between them was very gradual. One of the few moments when linguists can detect something of a revolution is when the Dutch standard language emerged and quickly established itself. The development of the Dutch language is illustrated by the following sentence in Old, Middle and Modern Dutch: Among the Indo-European languages , Dutch is grouped within the Germanic languages , meaning it shares

18492-484: The urban dialects of the province of Holland . In 1637, a further important step was made towards a unified language, when the Statenvertaling , the first major Bible translation into Dutch, was created that people from all over the new republic could understand. It used elements from various, even Dutch Low Saxon , dialects but was predominantly based on the urban dialects of Holland of post 16th century. In

18630-605: The yacht industry on the island. Mullet Pond is the 55th Ramsar site since 2016 and therefore protected according to the Ramsar Treaty, a global commitment to protect ecologically significant wetland areas. The effects of climate change are felt on Sint Maarten. According to the Netherlands Antilles Coral Reef Initiative, the coral reefs were fragmented due to a temperature rise to 30 °C in 2005. Twenty years ago [when?],

18768-464: Was respected locally, it was not until 1863 when the Dutch abolished slavery in all of their island colonies that the slaves became legally free. After the abolition of slavery, plantation culture declined and the island's economy suffered. In 1939, Sint Maarten received a major boost when it was declared a duty-free port. In 1941, the island was shelled by a German U-boat as part of the Battle of

18906-527: Was under foreign control. In the 19th century, the East Indies trade started to dwindle, and with it the importance of Malacca as a trading post. The Dutch state officially ceded Malacca to the British in 1825. It took until 1957 for Malaya to gain its independence. Despite this, the Dutch language is rarely spoken in Malacca or Malaysia and only limited to foreign nationals able to speak the language. After

19044-650: Was used to finance Hamas , its associate Holy Land Foundation , and the Taliban . In April 2009, former Commissioner Louie Laveist was convicted, and sentenced to an 18-month prison sentence, by the Sint Maarten Court-of-First-Instance, on account of forgery, fraud, and bribery. He was later acquitted of forgery and of fraud by the Common Court of Justice of the Netherlands Antilles and Aruba , but not of bribery. Sint Maarten

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