Military police are investigating around 40 cases of threats made to the families of Dutch soldiers serving in Iraq, a daily newspaper reported here on Saturday.
At least 40 relatives of Dutch soldiers received threatening calls or text messages before the country's troops left Iraq in March 2005, Christian daily Nederlands Dagblad said.
It was not clear whether the threats were aimed at the soldiers themselves or their relatives.
Separately, Acom, a Christian army union, has registered two complaints from relatives of soldiers stationed in Afghanistan who have had threatening telephone calls, the newspaper reported.
A spokesman for the defence ministry told the newspaper the culprits could have been Islamic extremists, Dutch people who opposed the military missions in the two countries, or just pranksters.
The ministry has advised soldiers and their families not to be too explicit about their movements in the days following the threats, the paper said.
