好的，以下是提取、翻译后的结果：
NU.nl provides a unique insight with the podcast series Frans into how Frans Timmermans leads the opposition in politically exceptional times. Reporter Edo van der Goot followed the GroenLinks-PvdA leader since the summer of 2024 and was present at crucial moments. The first two episodes can now be listened to.
For the new podcast series, Van der Goot followed the 64-year-old Timmermans closely for a year. The political reporter attended debates in the House of Representatives and visited members’ evenings throughout the country in recent months. Behind closed doors, he held numerous conversations with Timmermans.
Van der Goot spoke with him about several defining moments in the past year. From the PVV’s election victory and the clashes with his political opponent Geert Wilders to the chaos regularly caused by the current, right-wing cabinet. Amidst all the developments in The Hague, GroenLinks-PvdA is on the verge of a historic decision. Because will GroenLinks and the PvdA merge into a new party? Members will express their views on this on June 21.
Van der Goot, who often interviews politicians but has never focused on one person for so long, got to know Timmermans better in the process. “If you follow someone for so long, you get a good picture of what someone is like. Also thanks to the conversations I had with people from or around GroenLinks-PvdA, experts and political scientists,” says the political reporter.
‘He really felt comfortable on the international stage’
During a trip in November to Zurich, Switzerland for an international lecture, Van der Goot saw that Timmermans is approached differently there than in his own country.
“In the Netherlands, it was then much about asylum and the emergency law. There was a crisis in the cabinet and the coalition. Normally, that creates opportunities for the opposition, but Timmermans was snowed under because GroenLinks-PvdA was accused of not having a clear asylum position,” he says. “But that was not the issue at all in Zurich. There he was again the important European Commissioner he had been for ten years. I had the impression that he really felt comfortable on that international stage. The contrast with the Netherlands was very large at that time.”
Whether Timmermans longs to return abroad is also discussed in Frans.
In August 2023, Timmermans was chosen by more than 90 percent of the members as the leader of GroenLinks-PvdA. Previously, he was, among other things, European Commissioner in Brussels, Minister of Foreign Affairs, State Secretary for European Affairs and PvdA Member of Parliament.