Dutch murder rate at 15-year low

19 January 2006

AMSTERDAM – There were 201 murders committed nationwide in 2005, the lowest figure for 15 years, according to Elsevier magazine’s annual Murder List.

Amsterdam is once again the murder capital of the Netherlands with 32 people killed, followed by Rotterdam (26) and The Hague with 15.

Worth noting is that Utrecht – the fourth-largest city – scores so low. Just two murders were committed there in 2005.

As for the provinces, Zuid-Holland had 68 murders – a rise on the year before when there were 53. For the second successive year there were no murders in Drenthe.

In the 1990s there was an average of 250 killings each year in the Netherlands. With 283 murders, 1997 was the worst annual total.

The police themselves compile no national figures for murder and manslaughter and in many regions their registration is incomplete.

Subject: Dutch news