Three arrests as national anti-asylum protests draw small crowds

Three people have been arrested as a weekend of small-scale protests against asylum seekers’ centres across the Netherlands passed off largely without incident.

The “national protest” drew around 1,200 people to demonstrations in nine cities, including Amsterdam, The Hague, Utrecht and Groningen.

The largest gathering was in Nijmegen, where a group of around 100 anti-asylum demonstrators on Plein 44 was outnumbered by between 500 and 1,000 counter-protesters waving Syrian and Palestinian flags.

City mayor Hubert Bruls said the anti-asylum demonstrators included people with “footballing allegiances” dressed in black. Two people were arrested during the protest, one for allegedly insulting police.

Organisers had planned to lay a wreath on the pavement outside the city hall to symbolise the death of democracy, but had to settle for scattering a bunch of white flowers instead.

In Groningen police had to intervene to prevent a stand-off between a group of 80 anti-asylum demonstrators and 200 protesters who turned out to express their support for refugees.

Nazi salute

One man was arrested for making a Nazi salute in Leeuwarden, another city where the majority of demonstrators were from left-wing groups such as Dolle Minas and Extinction Rebellion.

“If they’re making a noise for what they stand for, we want to show that not everyone in the Netherlands or Leeuwarden thinks like them.” organiser Caroline Tiedema said.

Organisers of the Nationaal Protest had pledged to hold protests in 12 towns in every Dutch protest, but only nine locations were named in online media. Drenthe, Zeeland and Flevoland were missing from the roll.

In the last few weeks police have made dozens of arrests at violent protests outside proposed refugee shelters in towns and villages such as Apeldoorn, Loosdrecht, IJsselstein and Den Bosch.

On Friday night three people were arrested after fireworks were thrown and a small group of demonstrators clashed with riot police outside a former school in Apeldoorn that the local council wants to turn into a temporary shelter for 240 asylum seekers.