(Radio France) This was another week of televised testimony from Belgian police investigators, with five of the accused still refusing to leave their cells in protest at the fact that the witnesses from Brussels are being allowed to testify anonymously. And then […]
(Radio France) If there is no doubt about the central part played in the November 2015 Paris terrorist attacks by Oussama Atar, the role of his brother, Yassine, remains much less clear. On Friday, a Belgian police officer presented as much evidence […]
(Radio France) The Paris attacks trial continued on Thursday with Belgian police giving evidence on the terrorist career of Oussama Atar, mastermind of the November 2015 murders that cost 131 people their lives. Atar himself is presumed dead in a coalition air […]
(Radio France) Wednesday, the 52nd day of the trial of 20 men suspected of involvement in the November 2015 Paris massacres, was devoted to Belgian police evidence, relaid by videolink from the office of the attorney general in Brussels. Four of the […]
(Radio France) The Paris attacks trial resumed on Tuesday with police evidence from Brussels on the background and Syrian activities of Mohamed Abrini. Abrini did not hear what was said about him, since he is one of five accused who continue to […]
(Radio France) The Paris special criminal court, where 20 men are being tried for their alleged participation in the November 2015 terrorist attacks in the French capital, this week heard evidence from an Austrian policeman in person, and from Belgian policemen via […]
(Radio France) The official aim of Friday’s session of the Paris attacks trial was to hear evidence from Belgian police investigators on the backgrounds of two of the dead terrorists and one other suspect. The hearing was, however, marked by the refusal […]
(Radio France) Four of the 14 men normally present in the courtroom at the Paris attacks trial in the central Paris Palais de Justice on Thursday refused to take their places in the box for the accused. Their legal teams explained that […]
(AFP) A Bulgarian court on Monday authorised the transfer of a man convicted of terrorism to Belgium, where he was sentenced in absentia to 20 years in prison in 2015. Yassine Lachiri was arrested in Bulgaria on November 10 after entering the […]
(AFP) A man convicted of terrorism in Belgium has been detained as he entered Bulgaria through its southeastern border with Turkey, prosecutors announced Thursday. Border police and state security agents intercepted the man on Wednesday in a special operation, the prosecution said […]
(Brussels Times) Islamic State (IS) terrorist and former head of Islamic radical group Sharia4Belgium, Hicham Chaib, was sentenced to life in prison in absentia and has been stripped of his Belgian nationality. After one hour of deliberation by the Antwerp Assize Court — […]
(Kurdistan 24) Belgian Islamic State (ISIS) fighters Olivier Calebout and Lucas Van Hessche have been sentenced to five years in jail by a court in Bruges, Belgium, for their membership in the group, Belgian media reported. The Belgian newspaper HLN reported that […]
(Brussels Times) Despite discrimination in Brussels institutions being illegal, a recent incident in which job applicants were prohibited from wearing a headscarf shows that it does still happen, says Brussels MP Fouad Ahidar. At the end of September, the Sainte-Geneviève Catholic elementary […]
(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) In a ruling on Thursday, the Belgian Constitutional Court supported the judgment of the European Court of Justice (CJEU) last December on banning animal slaughter without stunning. The ruling follows a request from the Belgian court to CJEU for clarification […]
(Brussels Times) On Monday, the Actiris unemployment office suspended a job offer from an elementary school in the Brussels municipality of Etterbeek that stated that “wearing a headscarf is forbidden.” The Sainte-Geneviève Catholic elementary school posted a job offer, looking for someone […]
(Brussels Times) The bank accounts of 295 terrorists are currently frozen in Belgium in an effort to prevent them from (aiding in) committing an attack. During 2021, 21 measures were taken to freeze assets, based on figures from the Coordination Office for […]
(AFP) Ten men accused of involvement in the March 2016 bomb attacks in Brussels that killed 32 people will face trial, Belgian federal prosecutors said Friday. Six of the suspects, including 32-year-old French-Moroccan Salah Abdeslam, are currently on trial in France over […]
(Radio France) The director of the investigation into the Belgian links to the November 2015 Paris attacks told the court on Tuesday that it was “the toughest case” she had ever worked on. She also praised the exceptional collaboration between France and […]
(Brussels Times) Security services have informed the Belgian prison system about a right-wing extremist staff member and another with radical Islamic tendencies. Criminal proceedings have been started against both, according to reporting from Belga News Agency. Belgium’s federal Minister of Justice Vincent […]
(National-UAE) A Belgian politician who investigated the suspected mastermind of the 2015 Paris terrorist attacks said mistakes have been repeated that have left youngsters at risk from dangerous radicalisers in their communities. Belgian-Moroccan citizen Oussama Atar is believed to have been killed […]
(Brussels Times) The Belgian Francophone broadcaster RTBF found recordings of an interview with terrorist Salah Abdeslam and two of his accomplices, immediately after the terror attacks in Paris, in its archives. On 14 November 2015, the morning after the terror attacks in […]
(Brussels Times) The Taliban takeover in Afghanistan is not expected to lead to an increased risk of terrorist acts in Belgium in the short term, experts said on Monday. The risk is also limited in the longer term, as the Taliban will […]
(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) The police in Belgium have a shortage of ammunition for their anti-terrorist weapons (SCAR machine guns) that were purchased after the attacks in Zaventem and Brussels. Belgium’s police had concluded a contract with an American company for €1 million for […]
(Reuters) Six EU member states have warned the bloc’s executive against halting deportations of rejected Afghan asylum seekers arriving in Europe despite major advances of Taliban militants in their country. The Taliban, fighting to reimpose strict Islamic law after their 2001 ouster, […]
(Middle East Eye) On 16 July, the majority of the women and children held at al-Roj camp were still asleep when a convoy of cars entered the open-air prison in northeastern Syria. A few minutes later, at around 5.30am, six Belgian [women] […]
(Breitbart) A jihadist wanted by Spain on a European arrest warrant (EAW) has been apprehended by Belgian police in the no-go zone of Molenbeek, Brussels, a notorious hotbed of radical Islamist activity. The 22-year-old jihadist had previously been sentenced to two years […]
(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 […]
(BBC) Ten children and six mothers held in a prison camp for jihadists in Syria have been flown home to Belgium. It is the biggest repatriation of suspected Islamic State (IS) members since the group’s fall in 2019. Hundreds of Europeans who […]
(Euronews) The resignation of a government representative in Belgium has sparked fresh political debate about Islamic headscarves. [Ihsane] Haouach, a Belgian-Moroccan woman, stepped down on Friday from her role as a government commissioner at the Institute for the Equality of Women and […]
(Brussels Times) The decision to implement women-only hours and allow the wearing of a burkini in Brussels’ recently opened public open-air swimming pool is at the base of a political debate in Belgium. The FLOW swimming pool opened its doors in the […]
(Brussels Times) On Friday, the leader of the Francophone liberal MR party, Georges-Louis Bouchez, protested against the fact that Brussels’ first public open-air swimming pool allows women to wear a burkini. The FLOW pool, which opened at the Pierre Marchant bridge in […]
(AFP) Belgium on Thursday transferred suspect Mohamed Abrini to France to stand trial in September among 14 people accused of involvement in the 2015 Paris attacks, sources close to the case said. Abrini — known as the “man in the hat” from […]
(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 president of the Francophone liberal MR party, Georges-Louis Bouchez, put the topic of the ban on headscarves back on the table following the appointment of Ihsane Haouach as government commissioner at the Institute of Equality for Women and Men. […]
(Brussels Times) The Brussels public transport operator STIB-MIVB has decided not to appeal a discrimination conviction related to employees wearing headscarves, paving the way for an abolishment of the existing ban on head coverings that signal religious, political or philosophical beliefs. “STIB […]
(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) The Jewish Museum in Brussels commemorated the seventh anniversary of the terror attack that took place there on 24 May 2014 with a subdued ceremony. The commemoration was attended by Chief Rabbi Albert Guigui, Brussels Minister-President Rudi Vervoort and Brussels […]
(Reuters) An Iranian diplomat sentenced to 20 years in prison for planning a bomb attack in France has dropped an appeal in Belgium and will serve his sentence, his representative said on Wednesday. Belgian authorities have said they will oppose any potential […]
(Swiss Info) Despite multiple pleas from international bodies, Switzerland refuses to repatriate adult detainees from Syrian camps, a policy that effectively leaves seven Swiss children stranded in the war-torn country. They were just four and nine years old, when in 2016 their […]
(Brussels Times) The Federal Prosecutor’s Office is sticking to its initial submissions regarding the suspects charged with involvement in the 2016 Brussels attacks that left 32 people dead, spokesman Eric Van der Sypt said on Sunday. Confirming information carried by La Dernière […]
(Kathimerini) Legal procedures have been launched for the extradition to Belgium of three Iraqi nationals who were arrested in Athens last week on European arrest warrants. All three are accused of participating in a ring based in Belgium that trafficked migrants and […]
(AFP) The children of European jihadists left trapped in a Syrian camp after their fathers’ defeat on the battlefield now face radicalisation in their turn, a Belgian expert warns. Heidi De Pauw, director of the association Child Focus, has visited orphans and […]
(Brussels Times) Belgium is being taken to court by 19 victims of the terror attacks on Brussels Airport and Maelbeek metro station on 22 March 2016. “We accuse the government of a lack of information, a lack of help and inadequate legislation,” […]
(AFP) “Aline, Patricia, Leopold, Gilles, Johanna, Loubna …” Five years on, the 32 victims of the Brussels bomb attacks were the focus of Monday’s national day of commemoration. The March 22, 2016, bombings were the worst massacre in the country’s modern peacetime […]
(AFP) It has been five years since Islamist bombers slaughtered 32 people in the Belgian capital Brussels, in an attack then-prime minister Charles Michel says changed the country forever. In an AFP interview, Michel — now the president of the European Council […]
(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 […]
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