Killings were a deliberate act against royals, perpetrator tells police. ISABEL CONWAYreports from The Hague
A SIXTH victim, a military policeman on security duty protecting the royal family, has died as a result of the Apeldoorn attack in the Netherlands.
Thursday’s attack appeared to have been ruthlessly planned against the Dutch monarchy on the one day in the year when they are truly among the people, mingling, chatting, at pains to act normally – and easy targets? Or was it the desperate deed of a madman, unhinged after losing his job and about to be evicted from his home?
The real reason for Karst Tates’s drive of death through the streets of Apeldoorn on Koninginnendag (Queen’s Day), the Netherlands’ biggest national holiday, may never be known. The 38-year-old former security guard died in hospital yesterday of injuries he sustained after crashing his car into a monument beside the bus carrying Queen Beatrix and most of the Dutch royal family, having left carnage in his wake. He told the emergency services at the scene that it was a deliberate action against the royal family.
Sketchy details of his recent past have since been unearthed in a sleepy village, Huissen, close to Arnhem where he lived.
Karst Tates, who sometimes shaved his head and favoured skinhead-style fashion, had recently been sacked and was due to hand over the keys to his home to a new tenant on Friday because he could not pay his rent.
A psychiatrist quoted in one Dutch newspaper believes Tates’s action may have been the result of the current economic crisis and the threatened swine flu pandemic, which triggered an apocalyptic desperation in someone with no history of mental illness and who had never come to police attention.
Described by neighbours as “a quiet man who kept to himself” and “a model tenant”, Tates is thought to have haphazardly planned Friday’s attack, in which people gathered for the annual royal procession in Apeldoorn were mown down, his car narrowly missing the open-topped bus carrying the royal family.
Six people have died and 12 have been injured. Thousands watched in disbelief and millions more were later to watch on TV the scenes of panic and mayhem as bodies were tossed in the air.
Queen’s Day on April 30th is the occasion when Queen Beatrix, admired for her professionalism but sometimes perceived as rather cold and distant, is surrounded by her family and embarks on a powerful public relations mission. They are seen to exude warmth and charisma, going biking, dancing, playing old Dutch traditional games, and are cheered by waving subjects wearing symbolic orange and plastic crowns.
The Netherlands’ reputation for tolerance and open-mindedness, shaken by the assassination in 2002 of populist politician Pim Fortuyn and shattered when film- maker and writer Theo van Gogh was butchered on the streets of Amsterdam by a Muslim fundamentalist, has been dented.
However, commentators yesterday said that in the wake of political murders and the country’s ongoing difficulties over immigration and multiculturalism, Queen Beatrix has remained an important symbol of Dutch unity and tradition. “A national illusion died in Apeldoorn,” commented de Volkskrant. “We will never see it like this again, a queen and her family, free and approachable.”
Speculation has been growing in the Netherlands that Queen Beatrix (71) may abdicate this year, handing over power to Crown Prince William Alexander, who became 42 on Wednesday. Her late mother Queen Juliana, whose 100th birthday was being celebrated on Queen’s Day, abdicated at the age of 71.
Visibly shaken and grey-faced as she made a rare appearance on Dutch TV after Friday’s attack, Queen Beatrix, who is extremely determined and strong, may decide this is the time to accentuate her strength and relevance. Or she may feel, having witnessed a scene of unparalleled horror, that the time has come to retire.