Arrested the driver who rammed a terrace in Brussels and Belgium lowers the anti-terrorist alert

The authorities do not confirm that it is an attack

The driver who hit a terrace in a central area of ​​Brussels this Friday with his van, leaving six slightly injured, and subsequently fled, has been located and arrested in Antwerp, in the north of the country.

"The investigations led to the location of a suspect who was arrested this afternoon by the Police in Antwerp. He will be questioned and we will see what measures to adopt," confirmed the spokeswoman for the Brussels Prosecutor's Office, Willemien Baert, at a press conference.

At least six people have been slightly injured after a van collided with a terrace in a central area of ​​​​the capital around 1:00 p.m. The injured people are not seriously injured and did not have to be evacuated to hospital.

As can be seen in some recordings, the people on the terrace were able to avoid the van that was speeding down a narrow street, close to the most important commercial artery in Brussels.

As explained by Baert, the authorities work with all the hypotheses, so they have not confirmed that the episode is an attack. "I know that the events are reminiscent of attacks that occurred in the past, but at the moment it is still not certain that it was an attack. It is also possible that it was just an accident. We will have to wait for the continuation of the investigation to know the exact reason," he assured.

For its part, the Francophone network RTBF has reported that the detainee is a 28-year-old man who is not known by the security forces for having extremist tendencies.

Shortly after the incident, the Threat Coordination Office has raised the anti-terrorist alert in the Belgian capital, going to level 3 on a scale out of 4. A step that has been reversed in a matter of minutes after knowing the identification of the possible perpetrator of the incident .

"The driver of a van has collided with a terrace," explained the spokesman for the Brussels Capital Police, Ilse van de Keere, who confirmed that the driver had fled. Police found the van that hit the terrace a few hours after the episode in an area not far from the scene of the incident.

As explained by the mayor of Brussels Phillipe Close, the van would have turned around on the same street where it hit the terrace of a bar. "Fortunately people were able to avoid the van. People are shocked but none of the injured had to be evacuated," he said in statements collected by the newspaper 'Le Soir'.