Category Archives: Belgium

EU committee votes to lift immunity from two MEPs amid ‘Qatargate’ inquiry

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European parliament expected to back committee and strip Marc Tarabella and Andrea Cozzolino of immunity from prosecution

A European parliament committee has voted to lift immunity from two MEPs after a request from Belgian authorities investigating the “Qatargate” bribery and corruption scandal that has shaken the EU assembly.

MEPs on the European parliament’s legal affairs committee voted unanimously with no abstentions on Tuesday to strip immunity from Belgium’s Marc Tarabella and Italy’s Andrea Cozzolino.

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Belgian buyer of Europe’s spare tanks hopes they see action in Ukraine

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OIP built up a huge private arsenal, banking on there one day being demand for the weapons again

On the outskirts of Tournai, a sleepy medieval town in the gentle, Brueghelian landscape of the French-speaking part of Belgium, there is an unassuming grey hangar, barely hidden behind a fence. Inside are rows upon rows of German-made Leopard 1 tanks and other heavy fighting vehicles – some of the same types of weapons that top Ukraine’s military wishlist.

The hangar belongs to the Belgium defence company OIP and contains one of the biggest privately owned reserves of weapons in Europe. “Many of these tanks have been sitting here for years. Hopefully, now it is the time they finally see some action in Ukraine,” said Freddy Versluys, the head of OIP, as he toured the hangar.

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Belgium: family say death of Belgian-Tunisian woman in custody not suicide

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Death of Sourour Abouda casts spotlight on treatment of minority ethnic citizens by Belgium’s police

The death of a Belgian-Tunisian woman in police custody earlier this month has been rejected by her family as a case of suicide, while casting a spotlight on the treatment of minority ethnic citizens by Belgium’s police.

Sourour Abouda, a 46-year-old NGO worker, was found dead in a police cell early in the morning of 12 January, after being arrested several hours before. She had been found drunk in the fashionable district of Place Châtelain in Brussels and taken to a police station in the city centre, according to local media reports that have not been officially confirmed.

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Greek MEP Eva Kaili to stay in custody after corruption charges, says court

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Kaili is one of four charged with corruption and money laundering in relation to Qatar and will go on trial in Belgium

Eva Kaili, the Greek member of the European parliament at the centre of a cash for influence scandal implicating Qatar, will remain in jail pending trial, a Belgian court has decided.

“In its order this morning, the pre-council chamber extended the pre-trial detention of EK by one month,” said a statement from the Belgian federal prosecutor’s office. If Kaili chooses to appeal against the decision within 24 hours, she will appear before a chamber at the Brussels court of appeal within 15 days.

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Four people charged over Qatar’s alleged bribing of EU officials

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Charges come after Belgian police made six arrests and seized phones, computers and €600,000 in cash

Belgian prosecutors investigating allegations that Qatar has sought to influence EU policy by bribing European parliament officials have charged four people with money laundering, corruption and participating in a criminal organisation.

The charges, which were announced on Sunday, came two days after police arrested four people and seized computers, mobile phones and €600,000 (£515,000) in cash during searches at 16 properties across Brussels.

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Trial of 10 accused in 2016 Brussels terror attack begins on Monday

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Survivors will give evidence in specially constructed court after Belgium’s worst peacetime atrocity

Ten men will go on trial accused of playing a role in the Brussels terror attacks of 2016 that killed 32 people and injured hundreds in what was Belgium’s worst peacetime atrocity.

The trial, taking place in a specially constructed court in Nato’s former headquarters in the north of the Belgian capital, begins proceedings on Monday, more than six and a half years after the attacks on Brussels airport and Maelbeek metro station on 22 March 2016.

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30 tonnes of cocaine seized in raids against European ‘super cartel’

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Arrests made in Belgium, France, the Netherlands, Spain and Dubai, including one ‘extremely big fish’

A “super-cartel” that controlled one-third of the cocaine trade in Europe has been taken down in six countries, police have said.

The EU police agency, Europol, announced that 49 suspects were arrested during the investigation, after raids in Europe and the United Arab Emirates targeting the cartel’s “command and control centre” and logistics network.

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Brussels tries to cool locals’ anger over ‘racist’ street murals – with QR codes

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City authorities hope to soothe those who are ‘deeply shocked’ by the comic-strip trail of Belgium’s rich history

In the centre of Brussels, close to the monumental Palais de Justice, is a brightly coloured cartoon painted down a strip of a scruffy four-storey building. Playing on the stories of crime and judgment unfolding in the nearby courtrooms, the mural shows heaven and hell. In the blue skies, a caricatured police officer flies over a topless woman sunbathing, while a white officer eyes a black man; down below, the red-tailed devil looks grumpy.

The work, from a popular cartoon that first appeared in the 1980s, is just one of 68 murals celebrating Belgium’s rich history of comic strips, or bandes dessinées, including figures such as Tintin, Lucky Luke and the Smurfs.

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Protesters who targeted Girl with a Pearl Earring jailed by Dutch court

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Two activists from Just Stop Oil Belgium each sentenced to two months in prison with one month suspended

Two Belgian climate change activists who last week targeted the Johannes Vermeer painting Girl with a Pearl Earring have been sentenced to two months in prison by a Dutch court, of which one month was suspended.

One activist glued his head to glass covering the painting at a museum in The Hague. The artwork was not damaged, gallery staff said.

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What are European countries doing to cut power consumption?

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Governments across the continent have announced a range of measures to tackle any energy shortages this winter

Paris is switching off the Eiffel Tower lights an hour early, Milan has turned off public fountains, and Hanover is offering gym users cold rather than hot showers in an effort to combat potential energy shortages this winter.

At the same time, the public are being encouraged to do their bit by avoiding using household appliances between 4pm and 7pm, stock up on blankets and slow down their driving.

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‘New PM, old problems’: Europe’s media reacts to Liz Truss’s first speech as prime minister

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Spain’s El País greets new PM saying ‘lack of charisma can be a political advantage in times of uncertainty’

Liz Truss’s purported lack of charisma and the “disastrous” economic situation facing Britain is the focus for much of the European media following the appointment of the country’s new prime minister.

The apparent differences in style between Boris Johnson and his successor was picked up by newspapers and websites across the political spectrum but the conclusions on Truss’s first speech in office were generally generous.

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Weather tracker: flash floods as Europe’s heatwave ends with thunderstorms

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Torrential rains hit parts of England, Italy, France and Belgium, while in China flooding leaves 18 dead

Prolonged heat across parts of northern and western Europe ended with torrential showers and thunderstorms this week.

On Wednesday, parts of southern England received 50-65mm of rainfall within a few hours, causing London’s Gatwick airport to delay and cancel dozens of flights.

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Last veteran of Belgian SAS dies aged 97

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Jaak Daemen helped liberate the Netherlands and capture the German admiral who succeeded Hitler

The last veteran of the Belgian SAS has died aged 97, marking the loss of another living link with the second world war in Europe.

Jaak Daemen, a founder member of the Belgian SAS, which was created in 1944 to carry out sabotage and intelligence gathering behind enemy lines, died earlier this month.

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Nephew of jailed Hotel Rwanda dissident hacked by NSO spyware

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Latest findings suggest Rwandan government has deployed surveillance campaign against relatives of Paul Rusesabagina

The mobile phone of a Belgian citizen who is the nephew of Paul Rusesabagina, a jailed critic of the Rwandan government made famous by his portrayal in Hotel Rwanda, was hacked nearly a dozen times in 2020 using Israeli-made surveillance technology, according to forensic experts at The Citizen Lab.

The findings follow earlier revelations by the Guardian and other media partners in the Pegasus Project, an investigation of Israel’s NSO Group, that Rusesabagina’s daughter, a dual American-Belgian national named Carine Kanimba, was under near-constant surveillance by a client of NSO Group from January to mid-2021, when the hacking attack was discovered by researchers at Amnesty International’s security lab.

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The Uber files: how the leak prompted outrage across the world

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From Europe to India and the US, the revelations have fuelled anger from across the spectrum, from the drivers to politicians

The release of the Uber files has prompted a frenzy of reaction around the world, piling pressure on senior politicians, fuelling calls for a crackdown on corporate lobbying and drawing outrage from groups including traditional taxi drivers.

The fuse was lit with the publication of revelations from a trove of more than 124,000 documents about Uber spanning from 2013 to 2017, leaked to the Guardian and shared with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and international media.

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Critics told ‘lives at stake’ over Belgium-Iran prisoner swap treaty

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Belgian justice minister tells MPs if bill not approved threat to Belgian interests will increase

Belgian politicians who support a treaty that would permit the swap of an Iranian diplomat jailed in Belgium for Belgians held prisoner in Tehran have told the treaty’s opponents that “lives are at stake”.

MPs were told during a debate on Tuesday that there were serious risks to Belgians being kept in Iran if they voted against ratifying the treaty, which is set to be a first of its kind among European countries.

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Salmonella halts production at world’s biggest chocolate factory

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Contamination found at plant in Belgium run by Swiss group Barry Callebaut

Production has been halted in the world’s biggest chocolate plant, run by the Swiss group Barry Callebaut in Wieze, Belgium, after salmonella contaminations were found.

A company spokesman said production had been protectively halted at the factory, which produces liquid chocolate in wholesale batches for 73 clients making confectionaries.

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DRC buries independence hero Patrice Lumumba’s tooth, his only remains

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Coffin containing tooth is buried in ceremony on 62nd anniversary of DRC’s independence

The family of the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s murdered independence hero Patrice Lumumba buried his only known remains – a tooth – in the capital, Kinshasa, on Thursday, 61 years after his death at the hands of Belgian-backed secessionist rebels.

Hundreds gathered in a vast square for the occasion, waving flags and looking upon a large photo of Lumumba, with his trademark horn-rimmed glasses and side-swept hair, framed by white flowers.

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Appetite for frogs’ legs in France and Belgium ‘driving species to extinction’

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Conservationists say exploitation of amphibians leading to depletion of native species abroad

A voracious appetite for frogs’ legs among the French and Belgians is driving species in Indonesia, Turkey and Albania to the brink of extinction, according to a report.

Europe imports as many as 200 million mostly wild frogs every year, contributing to a serious depletion of native species abroad.

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Tokyo mayoral win a ‘huge surprise’ for candidate living in Belgium

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Japanese national Satoko Kishimoto won ward of 500,000 people 5,800 miles away with online campaigning

A Japanese woman living in Belgium has been elected as mayor of a district in Tokyo after coming to prominence through her online campaigning during the Covid pandemic.

Satoko Kishimoto, 47, who has lived in the Belgian city of Leuven with her husband and children for a decade, is now mayor of Suginami city, a ward of 500,000 people, more than 5,800 miles away from her home.

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