AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - The Netherlands has nominated Foreign Minister Frans Timmermans, a veteran diplomat, as the country's candidate to join the EU Commission, Prime Minister Mark Rutte told parliament on Tuesday.
The announcement was made after Timmermans met incoming Commission President Jean-Claude Junker in Brussels about taking up a senior role in the European Union's executive body.
Rutte did not specify which post Timmermans had been nominated for, but Dutch media on Tuesday said he was discussing taking up a vice president post in charge of inter-institutional relations, reform and administering the Commission's 50,000-strong civil service.
Timmermans gained international prominence with the emotional speech he gave at the United Nations following the July 17 shooting down over eastern Ukraine of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17, which had 196 Dutch nationals on board.
Jeroen Dijsselbloem, who heads the Eurogroup of euro zone finance ministers, had been mentioned earlier as a possible Dutch candidate, as had Lilianne Ploumen, the trade and development minister.
Timmermans, who speaks Russian and served as political officer at the Dutch Embassy in Moscow, will be the first Dutch Labour Party commissioner in many years, after a long line of conservatives to have served in Brussels.
(Reporting by Anthony Deutsch and Thomas Escritt; Editing by Alison Williams)