AMSTERDAM, June 21 (Reuters) – Dutch insurer Aegon
said it would refocus on new markets, cut costs and adjust
prices to convince investors it can aggressively target 7-10
percent in annual earnings growth after repaying state aid.

The Dutch government spent nearly 40 billion euros ($57
Billion) when it was forced to either nationalise or bail out
several financial groups during the 2008 crisis, including ABN
AMRO , bancassurer ING , Aegon and SNS Reaal
.

HEERLEN, Netherlands (Reuters) – Dutch vitamins giant DSM (DSMN.AS: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) is cautious about acquisitions that it would have to carve-up to extract the businesses it wants to offset currency costs at its nutrition unit and expand its product mix.

DSM, the world’s leading vitamins maker, bought U.S. baby food ingredients maker Martek for $1.1 billion in February and is sitting on a war chest of more than 2 billion euros. It has repeatedly said it is on the lookout for suitable acquisitions.

AMSTERDAM/STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Swedish car maker Saab (SPYKR.AS: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) has agreed a rescue package from two Chinese car companies, handing over a majority stake in return for a cash injection to avert a potential collapse.

Saab owner Spyker Cars said on Monday it had signed a non-binding memorandum of understanding for Zhejiang Youngman Lotus Automobile Co to take a 29.9 percent stake in the company and Chinese car distributor Pangda (601258.SS: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) to take a 24 percent stake for a combined 245 million euros ($352 million).

STOCKHOLM/AMSTERDAM, June 13 (Reuters) – Saab Automobile has
agreed for China Youngman Automotive to take an equity stake in
the company as part of a distribution and manufacturing joint
venture in China aimed at rescuing the ailing Swedish carmaker.

Saab owner Spyker signed a deal with Chinese car distributor
Pangda (601258.SS: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) in May worth up to 110 million euros that
involved setting up a joint venture with Spyker and a partner in
China to start making Saabs in China within two years.

AMSTERDAM, June 10 (Reuters) – Dutch group AkzoNobel
(AKZO.AS: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) named Ton Buechner, head of Swiss machinery maker
Sulzer (SUN.S: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), as chief executive from April 2012, a move that
could see the world’s biggest paints company seek acquisitions.

Buechner, a keen snowboarder, will succeed Hans Wijers, 60
and CEO since 2003. Wijers, a former Dutch government minister,
has been credited with transforming AkzoNobel, moving it ahead
of U.S. rivals PPG (PPG.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and Sherwin-Williams (SHW.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz).

AMSTERDAM, June 6 (Reuters) – Dutch cancer test firm Agendia
aims to raise up to 90 million euros ($132 million) in an
initial public offering, testing the market with the first IPO
in Amsterdam of a healthcare firm since the 2008 financial
crisis.

Prospects for the healthcare and biotech sector have
improved, especially in the United States, after a fallow period
when several firms ran into trouble with clinical trials and
failed to get funding.

THE HAGUE (Reuters) – Former Bosnian Serb army commander Ratko Mladic faced the U.N. war crimes tribunal on Friday as a defiant general who never lost a battle, denying the charges against him as “obnoxious” and “monstrous.”

Formally charged by a U.N. tribunal which has waited 16 years to see him in the dock, he began with a wary appeal from a “very sick man” but ended with a defiant flourish of his old bravado, predicting he would be acquitted.

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – The trial of Ratko Mladic before the Yugoslav war crimes court will reopen old wounds in the Netherlands, whose troops were defending Muslims in the U.N. “safe haven” at Srebrenica when Bosnian Serb tanks rolled in.

What followed in July 1995 was a Dutch national humiliation.

Reassured by Mladic that no harm would come to the thousands in the enclave, the commander of the lightly-armed Dutch force drank a glass of champagne with the Bosnian Serb army commander.

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – The trial of Ratko Mladic before the Yugoslav war crimes court will reopen old wounds in the Netherlands, whose troops were defending Muslims in the U.N. “safe haven” at Srebrenica when Bosnian Serb tanks rolled in.

What followed in July 1995 was a Dutch national humiliation.

Reassured by Mladic that no harm would come to the thousands in the enclave, the commander of the lightly-armed Dutch force drank a glass of champagne with the Bosnian Serb army commander.

THE HAGUE (Reuters) – Former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic used his power to commit atrocities that tore a nation apart and destroyed communities, and he must be held to account, a U.N. war crimes prosecutor said on Wednesday.

Chief prosecutor Serge Brammertz said Mladic, who was arrested in Serbia last Thursday and extradited after 16 years on the run, will face genocide charges at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia on Friday.