Dutch Empire lost a number of its colonial possessions and trade monopolies to the British Empire. Nevertheless, major portions of the empire survived until the advent of global decolonisation following World War II (1939–1945), namely the East Indies (Indonesia) and Dutch Guiana (Surinam). Three former colonial territories in the West Indies islands around the Caribbean Sea—Aruba, Curaçao, and Sint Maarten—remain as constituent countries represented within the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The territories that would later form the Dutch Republic began as a loose federation known as the Seventeen Provinces, which Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor and (as "Carlos I") King of Spain,
Dutch Suratte of influence. Dutch Suratte Suratte or Soeratte was a famous trading city on the north coast of what is now India, in the modern state of Gujarat, lying on the river Tapti. The city, now known as Surat, became a directorate of the Dutch East India Company in 1616. The British had established a factory in the Suratte in 1609 or 1612, after delivering a blow to the Portuguese. It is part of what is today known as Dutch India. Pieter van den Broecke established a Dutch trading post in Suratte in 1616, after previous efforts had failed in the