Amsterdam police said a car caught fire on the central Dam Square on Thursday afternoon following an explosion in the vehicle.
Police said the driver of the car was suspected of having caused the fire and had possibly done so on purpose. No injuries were reported.
‘Camera images show that the fire on the Dam was sparked after an explosion in a car,’ Amsterdam police said on X.
‘At that moment there were a lot of people close to the vehicle, but as far as we know, no bystanders were injured,’ police added.
It is suspected that the fire was deliberately started by the car’s driver ‘who was injured in the process,’ they said.
Images on social media show a man with burning clothes close to a small red car with flames lashing out the windows on the Dam Square. Police are seen extinguishing the flames on the visibly wounded man before taking him into custody.
Police said it had sealed off large parts of the square as explosives experts were investigating the car.
This comes just days after a 30-year-old knifeman from Donetsk, in eastern Ukraine, carried out a seemingly random attack around the streets of Dam Square.
Amsterdam police said a car caught fire on the central Dam Square on Thursday afternoon following an explosion in the vehicle
This is the moment the car drove onto the Dam Square before it burst into flames
Police said the driver of the car was suspected of having caused the fire and had possibly done so on purpose. No injuries were reported. Smoke started pouring out of the car in the screengrab above
Images on social media show a man with burning clothes close to a small red car with flames lashing out the windows on the Dam Square. Police are seen extinguishing the flames on the visibly wounded man before taking him into custody
This comes just days after a 30-year-old knifeman from Donetsk, in eastern Ukraine, carried out a seemingly random attack around the streets of Dam Square
Carrying multiple knives, the man attacked people around the square before being overpowered by a mysterious British man, believed to be in his 30s, who has since been dubbed the ‘Hero of Dam’.
The Briton sprinted after the attacker and kicked his ankle, sending him crashing to the ground, then sat on him until police arrived.
The victims were a 67-year-old woman and a 69-year-old man, both from the United States, a 26-year-old man from Poland, a 73-year-old Belgian woman and a 19-year-old woman from Amsterdam.
Four of the victims remain in hospital but their condition is stable, the prosecutors said.
Amsterdam mayor Femke Halsema thanked the British tourist, who has remained anonymous, for his ‘heroic act’ that likely prevented more people being attacked.
He is a very modest British man,’ she told the Amsterdam news channel AT5 after awarding him the city’s hero badge called heldenspeld.
‘He has no desire to become famous. He is now mainly concerned with the victims; he feels responsible for them.’
She said the tourist had shown ‘great instinct’ by overpowering the suspect moments after he had stabbed the fifth victim.
Amsterdam mayor Femke Halsema thanked the British tourist (pictured), who has remained anonymous, for his ‘heroic act’ that likely prevented more people being attacked
An Amsterdam police spokesman told the Dutch news outlet AD the ‘heroic’ British man did a ‘great job’ performing a ‘rare citizen’s arrest’
‘This man made a decision in a split second, which is truly exceptional and for which there should be a lot of appreciation,’ she added.
Halsema said all of them were in a stable condition, adding: ‘Everything is being done to determine the identity of the perpetrator.’
An Amsterdam police spokesman told the Dutch news outlet AD the ‘heroic’ British man did a ‘great job’ performing a ‘rare citizen’s arrest’.
The attacker was himself wounded in the leg and transferred to the medical wing of a detention unit in The Hague, where he is now being held in solitary confinement.
Dutch public prosecutors have now said that the knifeman acted with terrorist intent and likely would have stabbed more victims had he not been tackled by the Briton.
The Ukrainian man will remain in custody for at least two more weeks, suspected of ‘five counts of attempted murder or manslaughter with a terrorist intent’, prosecutors said in a statement.
He has not told authorities anything about his motives for the attack although local media reported that he has confessed to the stabbings.