Special Report: Global Financial Crisis    

    BRUSSELS, Oct. 31 (Xinhua) -- The European Commission said Friday it had approved a Dutch financial bailout plan intended to restore and facilitate the financing of Dutch financial institutions.

    The Commission found the Dutch plan to be in line with European Union (EU) rules on state aid for overcoming the current financial crisis.

    "The scheme constitutes an adequate means to remedy a serious disturbance in the Dutch economy while avoiding undue distortions of competition," it said.

    Dutch financial institutions were hard hit by the credit crunch due to the drying up of the interbank lending market in the wake of the financial crisis.

    The Dutch government adopted a guarantee scheme earlier this month which aims to tackle the liquidity problems of financial institutions created by the drying up of the market of unsecured loans. The plan involves a guarantee of 200 billion euros (261 billion U.S. dollars) in bank loans.

    "The Dutch guarantee scheme is an efficient tool to preserve the access of financial institutions to the short and medium term financing they need, but at the same time is ring-fenced against abuses," said EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes.