The Hague

Situated in the west of the Netherlands, The Hague is the country’s third largest city after Amsterdam and Rotterdam with 500,000 inhabitants. Known as a ‘green city by the sea’, it has 11km of coastline, while around one-third of the city is green space. As the largest Dutch city on the North Sea, it includes two distinct beach resorts, with Scheveningen attracting 10 million visitors a year—making it the most popular beach town in the Benelux area.

The Hague is the seat of the Dutch government and a base for nearly every international organisation in the field of peaceful administration. In The Hague, many people are working towards a peaceful and just world, in which conflicts are not settled on the battlefield, but in courts, without violence and not at the expense of innocent people. The Peace Palace in The Hague, with the International Court of Justice and Permanent Court of Arbitration, is the icon of its international position. There are over 130 international organisations here, including Eurojust, Europol and the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). The Hague is the United Nation’s second city, after New York.

Its unique nature is also attracting an increasing number of companies and institutions in the field of safety and innovation, along with more generic corporations. The region has over 300 international companies, with the head offices of Shell, AEGON and KPN being among the largest. The city has specialist clusters in the sectors of energy, IT and business services. Although The Hague shares an airport with Rotterdam, with several direct trains running per hour from Amsterdam Schiphol airport, most people travelling by air to The Hague use Schiphol. The city also benefits from good rail connections to Rotterdam, Utrecht and Brussels.