THE HAGUE, April 6 - A clear majority of people who voted Wednesday in a Dutch referendum rejected a far-reaching European Union free trade deal with Ukraine, and with all votes counted it was clear that the threshold of 30 percent voter turnout would be met and the result would be valid, the AP reported.

The turnout was at 32.2 percent, broadcasters NOS and RTL reported after all votes were counted and reported by municipalities to national news agency ANP's election service.

While it was long in doubt if the result would be valid, the sentiment among those in the nation of 17 million who voted was crystal clear: According to the ANP count, 61.1 percent rejected the EU-Ukraine pact and 38.1 percent voted for it. The remaining votes were blank or spoiled.

"It looks like the Dutch people said NO to the European elite and NO to the treaty with the Ukraine," tweeted popular anti-Islam, anti-EU lawmaker Geert Wilders. "The beginning of the end of the EU."

As expected, the vote underscored a deep-rooted skepticism about this country's place in Europe. The non-binding Dutch vote came less than three months before British citizens decide in their own referendum whether to leave the EU altogether.

The Netherlands is a founding member of the EU, a trading nation that benefits from its internal market, but paradoxically also a hotbed of Euroskepticism that rejected the bloc's proposed constitution in a 2005 referendum.
Exactly what will happen to the agreement now remains unclear.

But in a first reaction, Prime Minister Mark Rutte said: "If the turnout is above 30 percent, with such a big victory for the 'No' camp, you can't just go ahead and ratify the treaty."

However, Rutte said he would not be rushed into action, saying he wanted to discuss the result in his Cabinet, at the European Union and in the Dutch Parliament, a process that could take "days if not weeks."

The referendum was the first in the Netherlands since the 2005 rejection of the EU constitution and was forced by a loose coalition of Euro-skeptics that managed to gather nearly 430,000 signatures in just six weeks last year. Most often, deals like this are ratified by the governments of the 28 EU members, without any referendums.

Dutch opponents of the EU-Ukraine association agreement argued that its ultimate goal is bringing Kiev into the EU and argued the bloc shouldn't be dealing with Ukraine's leadership because of the widespread corruption in the country.

Much of the deal between the EU and Ukraine, already ratified by the other 27 member states, is being provisionally implemented but the Netherlands' ratification, approved last year by both houses of Parliament, was put on ice pending the outcome of the referendum.

In an interview earlier this year with a Dutch newspaper, EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker warned that a "No" vote "would open the door to a great continental crisis." (ap/ez)