Dutch authorities said that police had made the arrests overnight to Friday on a fourth night of demonstrations in The Hague sparked by the death in police custody of Aruban man Mitch Henriquez, 42.

Police said the protesters had thrown rocks and fireworks at officers, actions Prime Minister Mark Rutte criticized strongly.

Demonstrators also smashed windows in the district of Schilderswijk where the protests have been taking place since Henriquez died, police said. The district is inhabited largely by immigrants.

The disturbances continued on Thursday despite a police ban and a call for calm by the family of Henriquez, who died on Sunday a day after being arrested by force at a music festival.

Officers suspended

Initial autopsy results suggested the likely cause of death was suffocation, with authorities saying that the "police intervention" was apparently to blame.

This conclusion is backed up by mobile phone footage taken by witnesses that showed several police officers forcibly restraining and sitting on Henriquez, before he was put in a police vehicle in a limp state.

Five police officers have been suspended from duty over the incident.

tj/msh (Reuters, AFP)