Dutch police opened fire on protesters and seven people were injured in a riot broke out in central Rotterdam during protests against the Crown restrictions on Friday.
The mayor of the city described the demonstration as “an orgy of mass violence”. Mayor Ahmed Abu Talib told reporters in the prime hours of Saturday morning that “in on several occasions the police found it necessary to draw weapons to defend themselves “, while several hundred demonstrators set fire to the auto, lit fireworks and threw stones at the police. .
“Police shot demonstrators and people were injured,” Abu Talib said. The police also fired warning shots to stop the violence of the protesters and opened water cannons on them.
Abu Talib said several policemen were also injured in the violence. Twenty people have been arrested so far and more are expected to be arrested after reviewing video footage from security cameras.
The images of the scene show at least oneauto of the police on fire and another whose windshield was hit by a bicycle.
Police units across the country rushed to Rotterdam to help control the situation on Friday evening. THE media locals reported that gangs of rioters at football matches were involved in the riots.
Riot police managed to restore calm after midnight.
It was one of the worst outbreaks of violence in the Netherlands since coronavirus restrictions were first imposed last year. In January, rioters attacked police and set the streets of Rotterdam on fire after entering in force of curfew.
For his part, Justice Minister Fred Graberhaus condemned the events, stating in a statement: “The riots and extreme violence against police officers, riot police and firefighters last night in Rotterdam are disgusting.”
“Protesting is a great right in our society, but what we saw last night is criminal behavior that has nothing to do with protest,” he added.
In turn, the local political party “Levbar Rotterdam” condemned the violence in a tweet on “Twitter”. “The center of our beautiful city has changed tonight in a war zone – he said -. Rotterdam is a city in you can be in disagree with the things that happen inside, but violence is never the answer “.
Protesters had gathered to protest the government’s plans to prevent entry into closed places for those who do not have a pass health care, a passport showing that you have received a corona vaccination or have recovered. Even those who have not received the vaccination can have this passport, provided they can prove that they are disease-free.
The country has seen a number record of corona infections in the last few days and a new partial closure has entered in force a week ago.
And the Netherlands re-imposed some closing measures early last week for prime three weeks, with the aim of fighting an increase in infections.
Authorities registered more than 23,000 new infections on Thursday, and the previous highest daily rate was recorded in December 2020 of 13,000.
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