The Dutch Foreign Ministry announced Tuesday that a diplomat working in the Istanbul consulate has been pulled out of the country amid accusations that he engaged in spying activities in Turkey. Turkish newspaper Daily Sabah claims the man, with the initials A Z, worked for the Dutch military secret service MIVD and had been tracked by the authorities in Ankara for some time. Quoting an unidentified Turkish official, Al Jazeera reported that the diplomat was exposed by Turkey's National Intelligence Organization (MİT) while working to gather information about Operation Olive Branch against PKK-linked People's Protection Units (YPG) terrorists in northwestern Syria's Afrin.
The government of the Netherlands recalls a diplomat from Turkey after local newspapers accused him of spying.