The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday raised the travel alert for Belgium to yellow, meaning that tourists should pay particular attention to their safety and evaluate if a trip to the country is necessary.
The Taipei Representative Office in the EU and Belgium also said that Taiwanese students, expatriates and businesspeople should be wary when traveling in Belgium and Luxembourg. They advised travelers heading to Brussels to avoid locations where large groups gather, including shopping centers, large rally grounds, airports and train stations.
Taiwanese expatriates in Belgium can call 32-475-472-515 for emergency assistance, the ministry said.
In related news, Tessa Ko (柯彩雲), who manages European tours at a local travel agency, said there has been a decline in the number of people inquiring about trips to France after the Paris attacks, adding that tour groups that happened to be in Paris on Nov. 14 and Nov. 15 were indeed affected, because all of the museums in the city were closed.
However, as most museums in Paris reopened on Monday last week, the majority of Taiwanese with scheduled trips to the city have chosen to go ahead with their tours.
The Belgian capital was yesterday locked down for a second day, with police and troops on the streets as the authorities hunted for several suspects linked to the Paris attacks.
Belgian officials were due to meet later yesterday to decide whether to extend the security alert in Brussels, imposed over fears extremists were plotting similar strikes to the attacks in Paris, which left 130 people dead on Nov. 13.
The city’s metro system and public buildings were closed on Saturday, with shops and restaurants following suit after the terror alert was raised to the highest level of four because of what officials said was an “imminent threat.” Central Brussels, usually bustling on a Saturday evening, was virtually deserted, with police and troops on patrol.
Belgian Minister of the Interior Jan Jambon said authorities were looking for more suspects, not just Paris attacks suspect Salah Abdeslam, who managed to slip past French security forces after the carnage in the City of Light.
He warned that the capture of Abdeslam, a Belgian-born 26-year-old whose brother blew himself up at a cafe in Paris, would not in itself end the threat.
“It involves several suspects and that is why we have put in place such exceptional measures,” the Belga news agency cited Jambon as telling Flemish TV.
“We are following the situation minute by minute... there is a real threat, but we are doing everything possible day and night to face up to this situation,” he said.
Meanwhile a Turkish Airlines airplane flying from New York to Istanbul, Turkey, with 256 people on board was yesterday diverted to Canada because of a bomb threat, police said.
In Turkey, police arrested a Belgian of Moroccan origin in the resort city of Antalya, the site of last week’s G20 summit, along with two other suspects, probably Syrians.
Ahmet Dahmani, 26, reportedly scouted out targets for the Paris attacks.
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BULLY TACTICS: Beijing has continued its incursions into Taiwan’s airspace even as Xi Jinping talked about Taiwan being part of the Chinese family and nation China should stop its coercion of Taiwan and respect mainstream public opinion in Taiwan about sovereignty if its expression of goodwill is genuine, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. Ministry spokesman Jeff Liu (劉永健) made the comment in response to media queries about a meeting between former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) the previous day. Ma voiced support for the so-called “1992 consensus,” while Xi said that although the two sides of the Taiwan Strait have “different systems,” this does not change the fact that they are “part of the same country,” and that “external
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