The federal government in Belgium is taking five concrete measures in the short term in response to information about the course of events in the run-up to Monday’s attack in Brussels, which claimed the lives of two Swedes.
Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said this after a meeting of the core cabinet. He underlined “the particularly serious individual mistake by the Brussels public prosecutor’s office with very serious consequences.” The Prime Minister was referring to Tunisia’s extradition request for Abdesalem L., the suspect in the attack. The public prosecutor’s office did not respond to that request.
The Brussels public prosecutor’s office will therefore receive five more magistrates and a solution will be found for the long-standing problem surrounding the appointment of the Crown prosecutor. The Brussels federal judicial police will be reinforced by 50 people and the Brussels Railway Police will receive an additional 25 staff members.
Committees I and P, which control the intelligence services and police services respectively, are asked to analyze compliance with procedures and determine whether they are still satisfactory. Information flows between the Immigration Office, the police and the judiciary will also be strengthened. The services will further analyze the course of events leading up to the attack in Brussels.
Minister of Justice resigned
Belgian Justice Minister Vincent Van Quickenborne announced his resignation on Friday evening. He said he took responsibility for the “unacceptable error” surrounding the extradition request for Abdesalem L. Tunisia had requested the extradition of the man who committed a terrorist attack last year, but Belgium did not respond.
Tunisia submitted the extradition request on August 15 last year and it went via Justice to the Brussels public prosecutor’s office. According to Van Quickenborne, the competent magistrate subsequently took no action. “A mistake with dramatic consequences,” he said.
The radicalized suspect Abdesalem L. (45) came from Tunisia, but lived illegally in Belgium for years. He applied for asylum in Belgium in 2019, but that request was rejected a year later. Two Swedes were shot dead in Monday’s attack. A third Swede was injured. L. was shot dead by the police the next morning in a café in Schaarbeek, where he had an apartment.
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