Panic as car driven at crowd

BELGIUM: Belgian police and soldiers foiled a suspected terrorist attack in Antwerp yesterday when an armed Frenchman drove his car at speed towards a crowd of shoppers.

Troops forced the driver to stop as he hurtled through the city centre, sending pedestrians scattering, but he set off again and fled.

He was intercepted and arrested soon afterwards by a rapid response police team. No-one was hurt. Police said the car contained a pump-action shotgun, knives and a can containing an unknown liquid.

The arrested man, aged 39 and of Tunisian origin, lived in France, and his car had French number plates. He was identified as Mohamed R, born on May 8, 1977, a French citizen who was not known to the police as a terrorist suspect.

Belgium has been on heightened alert, with troops patrolling city streets, since last year’s bombings in Brussels and the Paris attacks of 2015.

‘‘A vehicle with French plates has tried to drive at high speed into De Meir [Antwerp’s main shopping street]. A man in camouflage was taken away,’’ Serge Muyters, the city’s police chief, said.

‘‘Taking into account what happened yesterday in London, it was decided to entrust the case to the federal prosecutor’s office,’’ he added, indicating that the man was suspected of planning a terrorist attack.

The London attack is thought to have been deliberately timed on the first anniversary of the Brussels bombings, which killed 32 people last March.

According to local reports, the suspect was under the influence of alcohol or drugs and did not resist arrest. French police sources said he might not have been trying to hit anyone, and could have been trying to escape a police check.

- The Times