close
close

Police: 1 person killed and another seriously injured in stabbing in Rotterdam

THE HAGUE, Netherlands — One person was killed and another seriously injured in a knife attack late Thursday in the Dutch port city of Rotterdam, police said. Police arrested a suspect who was also injured.

Police spokesman Wessel Stolle said officers were investigating the stabbing near the famous Erasmus Bridge. Stolle said there was no immediate information on the motive, but “we are examining all possible scenarios.”

The Dutch daily newspaper De Telegraaf reported, citing witnesses on the scene, that a man randomly attacked people with two knives while shouting “Allahu Akbar”, the Arabic phrase meaning “God is great”.

Stolle said police on the scene also heard the man shout the phrase and that “it was part of the investigation.”

A physical education teacher, Reniël Renato David Litecia, said he hit the attacker with two sticks after seeing him attack someone and managed to take the knives from him and throw them away.

He said he initially thought it was a fight, “but when I ran in that direction I saw it wasn't a fight. There was a man with two long knives stabbing another young guy, and when I started screaming he turned around and started walking towards everyone standing around him.”

Another police spokeswoman, Kristel Arntz, said the attacker is believed to have attacked one person in an underground car park and then a second victim near a busy terrace at the end of the bridge over the New Maas, which flows through Rotterdam.

Arntz also said it was too early in the investigation to determine a motive.

“We have arrested a suspect and will be questioning him. We will look at all witness statements and then examine what the possible motive was,” she said.

The identities of the victims and the suspect were not immediately clear.