The major international airport of the Netherlands, the Schiphol Airport, will begin using full-body scanners on passengers flying to the United States, the Dutch interior minister said on Wednesday.

The move is an attempt to prevent a recurrence of the security breach that allowed a would-be bomber to smuggle explosives onto a flight to Detroit from Amsterdam on Christmas Day.

At a news conference at The Hague in the Netherlands the interior minister, Guusje Ter Horst, there was no evidence that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab had been to the Netherlands before the flight, according to The Associated Press.

“It is not exaggerating to say the world has escaped a disaster,” Ter Horst said.

Dutch officials said Abdulmutallab, a 23-year-old Nigerian, had raised no red flags as he arrived in Amsterdam from Nigeria and transferred to his Detroit-bound flight at Schiphol Airport.

Abdulmutallabarrived at 5:37 a.m. on Dec. 25, passed through security screening at a metal detector without setting off any alarms and departed for the United States at 8:55 a.m.

Nigeria