Police prevent brawl between asylum seekers, Dutch youth

Police in Oisterwijk, Noord-Brabant, say they managed to break-up a "major brawl" between refugee youths and local young people on Tuesday night. The escalation was believed to have been the results of an earlier incident involving a fight between a small group of people on Klompven, police said in a statement. The group from the asylum center armed themselves with sticks and were ready to fight the native Dutch youths in retaliation when officers "put a stop to it," police said. They escorted the would-be refugees back to their housing center. Two people were arrested and taken to the Tilburg police station for question. Officers made a declaration against one person for providing a fake name. The names of all others involved were recorded in a police report. Police had raced to the scene en masse after receiving a call about a stabbing on Klompven, which turned out to be false. Mayor Hans Janssen admitted to Omroep Brabant in an interview that “friction between young people in Oisterwijk and the [asylum reception center] has occurred since last week, and because of this, extra surveillance has been employed." He also hopes that Tuesday's incident will bring police, prosecution and leadership at the refugee camp together to quickly address the issue, reported oisterwijknieuws.nl Reasons for the initial conflict were not released.