ANTWERP: Belgian security forces arrested a man on Thursday after he drove towards a crowded shopping area at high speed in the port city of Antwerp, officials said. Authorities found a rifle and bladed weapons in the car after the suspect, identified by prosecutors as a 39-year-old named Mohamed R., tried to flee and was detained in the northern city. The man was “under the influence of something” but it was not clear what substance, said a source close to the investigation.

Authorities were not certain if it was an attempted attack and the incident remained under investigation, several Belgian sources added on condition of anonymity. The prosecutor’s office said the man was a national of France, but a French police source said he was Tunisian holding French residency papers.

The incident jangled nerves following attacks at Orly airport in Paris and London, and coming the day after the first anniversary of the Brussels suicide bombings that killed 32 people. “A vehicle with French plates has tried to drive at high speed into the Meir [shopping street] so that pedestrians had to jump aside,” Antwerp police chief Serge Muyters told a news conference. “Our army colleagues forced the driver to stop but he pulled away and ran a red traffic light. We sent a special forces team and the car and the driver were stopped,” he added. “A man in camouflage was taken away.”

The Belgian federal prosecutor’s office said the suspect was driving at “very high speed” and that “at different times pedestrians were placed in danger. Different arms were found in the boot, bladed weapons, a pump-action rifle and a container of as yet unidentified liquid,” the prosecutor said in a statement.

“In light of what has initially been gathered, and taking into account what happened in London yesterday, it has been decided to send this case to the federal prosecutor,” the statement added.

Meir is the main commercial street in Antwerp’s historical centre and is mostly pedestrianised. It is one of the country’s biggest shopping areas.

With soldiers deployed at key sites, Belgium has been on high alert since March 22 last year when suicide bombers attacked Zaventem airport and Maalbeek metro station, killing 32 people and leaving more than 320 wounded.

Published in Dawn, March 24th, 2017