Man Blows Himself up in Empty Football Field in Belgium

A man reportedly blew himself up in an empty association football field in Belgium on July 31. (Google Street Views)

A man reportedly blew himself up in an empty association football field in Belgium, according to the AFP news agency.

The Verviers deputy mayor Hasan Aydin said July 31 that “the individual, whose identity is not yet known, blew himself up in the middle of the football field around 0830 in the morning.”

“He was alone in the middle of the field,” Aydin continued. “Suicide seems the most likely reason for the moment because if he had wanted to cause casualties, the man would have chosen another place at another time,” he added.

The man, according to the deputy mayor, is a man of European descent “in his fifties and a former career military officer,” AFP reported.

The country’s federal prosecutor’s office that investigates terrorism cases told AFP that they don’t believe the incident involves terrorism.

The field is used by amateur league team CS Verviers.

Aydin said that no one else was injured, Reuters reported.

“He walked calmly towards the center circle,” one witness told newspaper La Meuse, Reuters reported.

He then stopped there and blew himself up, the person said.

Belgium was rocked by Islamist violence in recent years. Verviers, an eastern town near Liege, was the scene in January 2015 of a shooting in which two men associated with later attacks in Paris and Brussels were shot and killed.

If you’re in an emergency in the United States or Canada, please call 911. You can call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on 1-800-273-8255. Young people can call the Kids Help Phone on 1-800-668-6868.