Dutch police said yesterday they were questioning six men and a woman who were arrested following an anonymous tip of a terrorist threat against a popular shopping area in Amsterdam.
The warning came in a call from an unregistered phone in Belgium, and appeared to be linked to the train bombings in Madrid exactly five years earlier. Police said one of those detained is a relative of an Islamic extremist involved in the Madrid attacks who committed suicide a few weeks later as police closed in.
The Madrid bombings killed 191 people and injured 2,000 others.
PHOTO: AFP
Police said all those detained were Dutch nationals of Moroccan descent. Their identities were not released.
Authorities were to decide later yesterday whether to keep the seven, aged between 19 and 64, in detention until they are brought before a judge.
The tip came on Wednesday night, Dutch Police Commissioner Bernard Welten said.
Welten said the informant, who used a prepaid mobile phone that was later traced to Brussels, told the police the alleged terrorists intended to kill as many people as possible in Amsterdam.
The informant said three explosives had been placed in various places in the shopping mall. He gave the Dutch police specific addresses and the location and details of a van that was allegedly used by the suspects.
On Thursday morning, police sealed off the area around a large Ikea furniture store and warehouse, and a nearby street of popular electronics and sporting goods stores adjacent to the Amsterdam Arena soccer stadium.
The stores remained shut on Thursday but were given the all-clear to reopen yesterday. Police kept a strong presence in the area.
A concert by the US rock group The Killers was postponed on Thursday night because the venue was near the stadium. The concert was rescheduled for later this month.
Searches and interrogations on Thursday provided no information that a serious threat remained, police said in a statement.
Amsterdam Mayor Job Cohen said no explosives were immediately found during the searches.
The Dutch anti-terror coordination office said the country’s threat level remained unchanged at “substantial,” the second-highest on a four-step scale.
The level has been unchanged for months, with experts warning that the Netherlands remains a terror target mainly because of an anti-Islam lawmaker’s film criticizing the Koran.
All intelligence services were put on alert and requested to provide information about the suspects.
National Anti-Terrorism Coordinator Theo Bot said there was no reason to take extra measures to thwart possible future terrorist attacks in the Netherlands.
Police said more arrests could be made in a later stage.
Special patrols took place by the military police in the shopping area, and a police helicopter circled over the area.
In December, the outgoing anti-terror coordinator Tjibbe Joustra described the threat level as “substantial-plus” because of Geert Wilders’ film Fitna.
The Netherlands has had no terrorist attacks on the scale of the Madrid bombings or London Underground bombings in 2005, which killed 52 people. But intelligence agencies have uncovered several alleged plots by Dutch Islamists, and several are serving jail sentences.
The country has been on alert against Islamic extremism since the 2004 murder of filmmaker Theo van Gogh.
Taiwan aims to open 18 representative offices and seven Taiwan Tourism Information Centers worldwide by next year to attract international visitors, the Tourism Administration said on Saturday. The agency has so far opened three representative offices abroad this year and would open two more before the end of the year, it said. It has also already opened information centers in Jakarta, Mumbai and Paris, and is to open one in Vancouver next month and in Manila in December, it said. Next year, it would also open offices in Amsterdam, Dubai and Sydney, it added. While the Cabinet did not mention international tourists in its
EYES AT SEA: Many marine enthusiasts have expressed interest in volunteering for coastal patrols, which would help identify stowaways and illegal fishing, the CGA said Six thousand coastal patrol volunteers are to be recruited for 159 inspection offices to enhance the nation’s response to “gray zone” conflicts, Coast Guard Administration (CGA) sources said yesterday. Volunteer teams would be established to increase the resilience of coastal defense systems in the wake of two unlawful entries attempted by Chinese over the past three months, Ocean Affairs Council Minister Kuan Bi-ling (管碧玲) said. A former Chinese navy captain drove a motorboat into the Tamsui River (淡水河) in Taipei on the eve of the Dragon Boat Festival in June, while another Chinese man sailed in a rubber boat into the Houkeng
NEXT LEVEL: The defense ministry confirmed that a video released last month featured personnel piloting new FPV drone systems being developed by the Armaments Bureau Taipei and Washington are pushing for their drone companies to work together to establish a China-free supply chain, the Financial Times reported on Friday. A delegation of high-level executives and US government officials were yesterday to arrive in Taipei to discuss with their Taiwanese counterparts collaboration on drone technology procurement and development, the report said. The executives represent 26 US manufacturers of drone and counter-drone systems, while the officials are from the US Department of Commerce and the US Department of Defense’s Defense Innovation Unit, along with Dev Shenoy, principal director for microelectronics in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense
‘ANONYMOUS 64’: A national security official said that it is an attempt by China to increase domestic anti-Taiwanese sentiment and inflame cross-strait tensions The Ministry of National Defense’s (MND) Information, Communications and Electronic Force Command (ICEFCOM) yesterday denied accusations by China that it had undermined regional security by carrying out cyberattacks against targets in China, adding instead that Beijing was responsible for raising tensions and undermining regional peace. The Chinese Ministry of State Security on WeChat accused a hacker group called “Anonymous 64” of targeting China, Hong Kong and Macau starting earlier this year through frequent cyberattacks. The group carried out cyberattacks to seize control of Web sites, outdoor electronic billboards and video-on-demand platforms in China, Hong Kong and Macau, it said, adding the hackers’