(Brussels Times) Justice minister Vincent Van Quickenborne has ordered the civilian intelligence service to investigate the affairs of the Muslim Executive, the body that represents the country’s Muslims. Van Quickenborne (Open VLD) revealed his plans on last night’s broadcast of the investigative […]
(Brussels Times) Sam Van Rooy, a Vlaams Belang member of the Flemish parliament, is the subject of 1,777 complaints made to Unia, the official agency against discrimination. The complaints were orchestrated by the Facebook group Allemaal Van Belang, who accused Van Rooy […]
(Brussels Times) This morning a military aircraft landed at Melsbroek airfield outside Brussels, carrying six women and ten children repatriated from a refugee camp in Syria. The women, aged between 25 and 53 years, have been held in the Kurdish-run camp Roj […]
(Brussels Times) The government of Brussels region has decided not to appeal a decision by the public transport authority STIB to stand by a ruling of the labour tribunal in favour of a Muslim woman who was twice turned down for a […]
(Brussels Times) A man who helped the Thalys terrorist Ayoub El Khazzani to make contact with Islamic State in Syria in 2015 has been found guilty but allowed to go free by a court in Brussels. Yazan K., now aged 27, was […]
(Brussels Times) The government yesterday approved spending of €5.9 million on the Brussels justice service, to allow the organisation of the trial of the alleged terrorists involved in the 2016 terror attacks at Brussels Airport and the city metro. On 22 March […]
(Brussels Times) Next Monday, 22 March, sees the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attacks at Brussels Airport and on the Brussels metro at Maelbeek. But even five years after that shock, the country’s intelligence and security services are unable to work together […]
(Brussels Times) Two brothers who took part in the suicide bombings at Brussels Airport and Maelbeek metro in 2016 first carried out a random murder just to see what killing a human being would be like, according to investigation details revealed by […]
(Brussels Times) Federal defence minister Ludivine Dedonder (PS) has issued a formal refusal to consider a proposal from two N-VA MPs suggesting military personnel on street patrol be given more powers. The proposal comes from Theo Francken, formerly secretary of state for […]
(Brussels Times) The European Court of Justice (ECJ) in Luxembourg has upheld a ban by the Flemish government on animal slaughter without prior stunning. The court was responding to a request from Belgium’s Constitutional Court for a ruling on a point of […]
(Brussels Times) Hearings held to prepare for the mammoth trial of those accused of the March 2016 terrorist attacks are expected to end in Brussels today, earlier than expected. The hearings have been held in the new Justitia court site at the […]
(Brussels Times) Today sees the start of the trial of those accused of the terrorist attacks of 22 March 2016, which cost the lives of 32 people and injured 340 more. For the first time ever, the proceedings will take place in […]
(Brussels Times) Belgium’s Muslim Executive has responded angrily to accusations aired this week of Moroccan intelligence infiltration of the Great Mosque in Brussels. The mosque, in Cinquantenaire park in Brussels, had applied for recognition as a local faith community, after losing its […]
(Brussels Times) Federal justice minister Vincent Van Quickenborne (Open VLD) has declined to grant a new recognition to the Great Mosque in the Cinquantenaire park in Brussels, unless there is a change of management. The Great Mosque had its recognition as a […]
(Brussels Times) Flemish minister Zuhal Demir (N-VA) has said she is “relieved” at the arrest of a young man accused of sending her hate mail. The man, aged 24 and living in Demir’s home town of Genk in Limburg province, has admitted […]
(Brussels Times) The Limburg prosecutor’s office has begun an investigation into an alleged email threat made against Flemish mobility minister Zuhal Demir (N-VA). The threat came in an email addressed to Demir following recent comments she made in relation to mosques connected […]
(Brussels Times) Military patrols will be maintained on the streets of the country’s cities until 2 December at the earliest, the government has decided. In May this year, the caretaker administration of Sophie Wilmès took the decision to bring an end to […]
(Brussels Times) Brussels police have removed a number of posters depicting cartoons of the prophet Mohammed in the past week, Bruzz reports. The posters featured cartoons drawn by the artist known as Charb for the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo. Charb, born […]
(Brussels Times) The terrorists who carried out the attacks at Brussels Airport and the Brussels metro in March 2016 were able to go about their business unhindered thanks to the “passive and active support” of many of the residents of the Brussels […]
(Brussels Times) The Flemish minister for animal welfare, Ben Weyts (N-VA), said he is “fundamentally in disagreement” with the opinion handed down yesterday by the advocate-general of the European Court of Justice, declaring a Flemish ban on ritual slaughter illegal. Flanders has […]
(Brussels Times) A teacher of Islamic religion who was transferred from his school in Anderlecht in Brussels after publishing controversial remarks about the attack on the magazine Charlie Hebdo has no case for a breach of his freedom of expression, the European […]
(Brussels Times) The presence of military personnel on the streets of Belgium will be extended until 2 October, the federal council of ministers has decided. The use of the military for regular security work dates back to January 2015, when Operation Vigilant […]
(Brussels Times) The city council for Brussels-City has given the go-ahead for a demonstration against a ban on wearing the Islamic headscarf in public offices and in schools. However, the council warned the organisers they could be fined if the numbers taking […]
(Brussels Times) Zuhal Demir (N-VA), Flemish minister for justice and law enforcement, has called a halt to a programme set up with the region’s imams aimed at prisoners who have become radicalised while in prison. The programme — Theological Approach to Islamic […]
(Brussels Times) September sees the end of an operation which brought military patrols on the streets of Belgium’s cities for more than five years, defence minister Philippe Goffin (MR) has announced. The patrols of Operation Vigilant Guardian were intended to support the […]
(Brussels Times) Today is the fourth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on Brussels Airport and Maalbeek metro station, and a subdued commemoration will take place amid scenes of another national crisis. Four years ago this morning, terrorists exploded two suitcase bombs in […]
(Brussels Times) Five years ago this month saw the start of the military operation now known as Operation Vigilant Guardian (OVG), which saw the arrival of military patrols on the streets of Brussels and other cities, in response to a growing terrorist […]
(Brussels Times) Accused terrorist Salah Abdeslam held wide-ranging and open conversations with his fellow prisoners while he was detained in Bruges prison following his arrest in Brussels in March 2016, according to secret recordings made by Belgian state security. A document containing […]
(Brussels Times) The federal prosecutor, Frédéric Van Leeuw, has explained that the service remains fully occupied in the fight against terrorism, although their focus has now shifted towards what he calls “terrorism of inspiration” as opposed to structured terrorism, he told the […]
(Brussels Times) The number of new cases of terrorist activity opened by the federal prosecutor’s office fell in 2019 to 90, compared with 155 in 2018. The figure is significant as the first time since 2013 that numbers have been at the […]
(Brussels Times) One Belgian man was responsible for the planning of a series of terrorist attacks in Europe in 2015 and 2016, including the Paris attacks of November 2015 and the two attacks at Brussels Airport and Maalbeek metro on 22 March […]
(Brussels Times) The University of Leuven (KULeuven) will begin a new course for the training of imams in February. The course lasts six years. The training of imams was a point raised in the report of the parliamentary committee which looked into […]
(Brussels Times) The widows of three Islamic State combatants killed in the field have been sentenced to five years in prison and will lose their Belgian nationality on release, a court in Brussels has ruled. All of the women were tried in […]
(Brussels Times) Jean-Louis Denis, a convert to Islam who served five years in prison for preaching armed jihad and attempting to recruit young men to go and fight in Syria, has been banned from Molenbeek by the commune’s mayor, Catherine Moureaux. Denis, […]
(Brussels Times) The system of Passenger Name Record (PNR) in operation in Belgium since January 2018 has managed to track down 94 suspected terrorists and suspects involved in a variety of crimes, according to the government’s crisis centre. Under the PNR system, […]
(Brussels Times) The Muslim Executive, the body that represents Belgium’s Muslim community to the public authorities, is to take on 18 women in religion-related roles for the first time. The Executive will take on nine theological experts and nine preachers, who will […]
(Brussels Times) Abdelhay Bakkali Tahiri, president of the Islam party, has been fired from his job with Bruxelles Propreté for reasons which the agency denied were politically motivated. Tahiri (photo, centre) had worked for the regional waste management agency for nine years, […]
(Brussels Times) The federal state security agency has listed more than 100 organisations in Belgium representing the extremist religious Salafist tendency of Islam, according to a written answer provided to justice minister Koen Geens. Salafism is a tendency of Islam developed in […]
(Brussels Times) The Flemish government will not accredit any new mosques in the region for the next five years, according to home affairs minister Liesbeth Homans. Homans (photo) had commissioned a study from the university of Leuven, which she now says justifies […]
(Brussels Times) At the start of the trial of Mehdi Nemmouche, the man accused of carrying out an armed attack on the Jewish museum in Brussels in May 2014 in which four people died, the defence laid out its main five-point defence […]
(Brussels Times) Mehdi Nemmouche, the man accused of carrying out the attack on the Jewish Museum in Brussels in which four people died in May 2014, spoke briefly at his trial in Brussels yesterday, as we report elsewhere, and then took a […]
(Brussels Times) The Belgian intelligence services have warned of a growing trend for Muslim parents to take their children out of [the] schools system, for home-schooling which exposes the children to extremist Salafist propaganda. The state security was announcing its latest annual […]
(Brussels Times) The hijab — the headscarf worn by Muslim women as the minimum form of coverage — should be the subject of a ban in schools under the next legislature, according to federal secretary of state Zuhal Demir. “The headscarf has […]
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