AMSTERDAM, March 19 (Reuters) - The Netherlands'

parliament on Tuesday approved a series of motions calling on

the government to reduce dependence on U.S. software companies,

including by creating a cloud services platform under Dutch

control.

While such initiatives have foundered in the past due to a

lack of viable European alternatives, lawmakers said changing

relations with the United States under the presidency of Donald

Trump have given the issue fresh urgency.

"The question we as Europeans must ask ourselves is: do we

feel comfortable with people like Trump, (Meta CEO

Mark) Zuckerberg and (X owner Elon) Musk ruling over our data?"

said Marieke Koekkoek of the pro-European Volt party, who

authored one of the eight motions, in an email to Reuters.

In addition to launching a sovereign cloud services

platform, the motions called on the government to re-examine a

decision to use Amazon's ( AMZN ) web services for the

Netherlands' internet domain hosting, and to develop

alternatives to U.S. software and preferential treatment for

European firms in public tenders.

In a reaction, Amazon ( AMZN ) said its cloud is "sovereign" as

customers "have full control over where they locate their data,

how it is encrypted and who can access it," a spokesperson said

on Wednesday.

Amazon ( AMZN ) has invested more than 180 billion euros in the EU since

2010 and employs more than 1,000 workers in research and

development and corporate offices in Amsterdam and The Hague,

the spokesperson said.

The Dutch vote came a day after dozens of European tech firms

called on the European Commission to create a sovereign fund to

invest in European technology, including cloud infrastructure,

and a "Buy European" mandate.

A spokesperson for the Economic Affairs ministry declined

comment.

Bert Hubert, a Dutch technology expert who has advocated for

reducing dependency on the U.S., said: "This is only the first

step in potentially doing something."

But he said one important outcome would be forcing agencies

to publicly report on risks related to their reliance on U.S.

cloud firms.

"With the advent of Trump 2.0, it has become clear that this

is not something you can harmlessly sign off on," he said.