THE HAGUE – Dutch police arrested seven men Thursday suspected of plottingto carry out a “major terrorist attack” at a public event using explosivebelts and an AK-47 assault rifle, the public prosecutor s office said.

“Police arrested seven men on Thursday… suspected of being at a veryadvanced stage of preparation for a major terrorist attack in theNetherlands,” it said in a statement, adding one of the suspects had wantedto kill “many victims”.

Prosecutors and investigators were “convinced that a terrorist attack wasprevented” as a result of the arrests in the cities of Arnhem and Weertwhich followed a months-long police operation.

Officers had placed a group of people under surveillance, a central figurebeing a 34-year-old man of Iraqi origin convicted in 2017 of attempting toreach territory controlled by the jihadist Islamic State group, thestatement added.

Those arrested by elite special anti-terrorist police teams with helicoptersupport ranged in age from 21 to 34.

The suspects came from Arnhem, the port city of Rotterdam and villagesclose to those two cities. Two others in the group also had convictionsrelated to attempts to travel to Iraq or Syria.

“One of the men from Arnhem wanted to commit an attack with a group at amajor event in the Netherlands and kill many victims, according to theDutch Intelligence Service (AIVD),” the prosecutor s office said.

Police had yet to identify the target of the planned attack which theprosecutor s office said was to have included a separate car bombing.

The suspects, who investigators said were in possession of small arms whenthey were detained, are expected to appear in court in Rotterdam on Friday.

“They were seeking AK-47 assault rifles, grenades, explosive belts and rawmaterials with which to make other bombs,” investigators said.

The arrests came three months after two men were arrested in Rotterdam onsuspicion of preparing attacks in France and in the Netherlands.Prosecutors said earlier this month they were “close” to launching theirattack.

There has been no mention of what the target in France might have been.

In the Netherlands the pair are said to have staked out and “identifiedseveral possible targets” in Rotterdam, including “a police station and theErasmus Bridge”, the country s second largest.

On August 31, an Afghan aged 19 and with a German residence permit stabbedand injured two American tourists at Amsterdam s busy Central Stationbefore being shot.

The prosecutor s office said he had chosen the Netherlands for the attackbelieving Islam to be “frequently insulted” there.

The Amsterdam incident came following a Taliban call for attacks on Dutchtroops after far-right Dutch politician Geert Wilders organised ablasphemous cartoon competition.

The likelihood of a terror attack in the Netherlands “remainedsubstantial”, the Dutch anti-terror agency NCTV said last week, with terrorthreat levels remaining at level four out of five. – APP/AFP