1 September 2005

AMSTERDAM â€” Twelve people who were present during the riot at the Feyenoord-Ajax football match in April have turned themselves in to the authorities.

They were among the 17,000 mobile phone owners who received an SMS on Tuesday asking for their cooperation in identifying the rioters.

The mobile phones were logged as being in the area where football fans fought with police.

The SMS asked the recipients to surf to www.politie-rijnmond.nl on the internet and study  photographs of the alleged hooligans.

The police said on Thursday they received another 40 "good tips" from people who were sent the SMS.

A spokesman said that the 12 suspects had gone to the authorities because "the ground had become too hot under their feet".

"We advise others to come forward. The quickest way to have your photograph removed from the internet is to turn yourself in," the spokesman said.

Previously unreleased photographs of the riots were shown on television during crime-stoppers programme Opsporing Verzocht on Tuesday. Other photographs of  suspects were published previously.

"We are dong whatever it takes to catch the perpetrators of the riots," Rotterdam police chief Aad Meijboom told the programme.

He said his officers were working to arrest not only the rioters but also the spectators who egged them on. "They made the riot possible. If you are part of that group, you are jointly responsible," Meijboom said.

Henry Hambeukers, a spokesman for the Public Prosecutor's Office, emphasised on Tuesday that these people were not ordinary bystanders. "People who stand around shouting and roaring while dozens of others throw stones at the police are also liable for punishment for public order offences," he said.

[Copyright Expatica News + ANP 2005]

Subject: Dutch news