Belgian police detained 14 sus-pected Islamic extremists, and the government said they were plotting a jailbreak to free an al-Qaeda prisoner convicted of planning to attack US military personnel.
Authorities tightened security, warning of a heightened threat of attacks despite the arrests. Police stepped up patrols at Brussels airport, subway stations and the downtown Christmas market, which draws large crowds of holiday shoppers.
"Other acts of violence are not to be excluded," said Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt.
The US Embassy warned Americans that "there is currently a heightened risk of terrorist attack in Brussels," although it said it had no indication of any specific targets.
In a series of overnight raids around the country, police picked up 14 suspects and seized arms and explosives. The prime minister and prosecutor's office alleged the detained were planning to use the weapons to free Nizar Trabelsi, a 37-year-old Tunisian sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2003 for planning to a drive a car bomb into the cafeteria of a Belgian air base where about 100 US military personnel are stationed.
The Kleine Brogel base was reported to house US nuclear weapons, although that has not been confirmed by US or Belgian authorities. Security services in several European nations suspect Trabelsi, who trained with al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, had links with extremists in Britain, France and elsewhere in Europe.
"Trabelsi would be helped by a group of people driven by an extremist vision of Islam," the Federal Prosecutors' Office said in a statement on the arrests.
Details about the identities of the suspects were not immediately released, but the RTL-TVI television network said one of those detained was Malika El Aroud, the Moroccan-born widow of one of the suicide bombers who killed Afghan anti-Taliban leader Ahmed Shah Massood two days before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the US.
El Aroud, a Belgian resident, was acquitted in a Brussels court of involvement in Massood's killing in 2003. In June, she was convicted in Switzerland for supporting a criminal organization by running Web sites that posted statements from al-Qaeda-linked groups and showed executions.
She received a six-month prison sentence suspended for three years, which would keep her from going to jail unless she commits another punishable offense during that time.
Within hours of the arrests, police were out checking for suspicious packages and bags in the capital's landmark Grand Place, where tourists and local shoppers mingled beneath a huge Christmas tree. The Interior Ministry urged citizens to report anything suspicious.
"If a group with an extremist view of Islam was ready to use arms and explosives to release Mr Trabelsi, there is no guarantee that they would not use them for other ends," said Lieve Pellens, spokeswoman for the Federal Prosecutors' office.
The extra security measures were expected to last until at least Jan. 2.
Prison Inspector Claude Spinoit told RTL-TVI that he had spoken to Trabelsi on Thursday. He said the former professional soccer player was being held under tight security in Nivelles prison, 35km south of Brussels. Spinoit described Trabelsi as "calm" and said he had asked for isolation in order to pursue religious contemplation.
Trabelsi came to Europe in 1989 for a tryout with the German soccer team Fortuna Duesseldorf. He got a contract but was soon let go. Over the next few years, he bounced from team to team in the minor leagues, acquiring a cocaine habit and a lengthy criminal record.
Eventually, he made his way to al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan, where evidence showed he placed himself on a "list of martyrs" ready to commit suicide attacks.
South Korea’s air force yesterday apologized for a 2021 midair collision involving two fighter jets, a day after auditors said the pilots were taking selfies and filming during the flight and held them responsible for the accident. “We sincerely apologize to the public for the concern caused by the accident that occurred in 2021,” an air force spokesman told a news conference, adding that one of the pilots involved had been suspended from flying duties, received severe disciplinary action and has since left the military. The apology followed a report released on Wednesday by the South Korean Board of Audit and Inspection,
Indonesian police have arrested 13 people after shocking images of alleged abuse against small children at a daycare center went viral, sparking outrage across the nation, officials said on Monday. Police on Friday last week raided Little Aresha, a daycare center in Yogyakarta on Java island, following a report from a former employee. CCTV footage circulating on social media showed children, most younger than two, lying on the floor wearing only diapers, their hands and feet bound with rags. The police have confirmed that the footage is authentic. Police said they also found 20 children crammed into a room just 3m by 3m. “So
About 240 Indians claiming descent from a Biblical tribe landed at Tel Aviv airport on Thursday as part of a government operation to relocate them to Israel. The newcomers passed under a balloon arch in blue and white, the colors of the Israeli flag, as dozens of well-wishers welcomed them with a traditional Jewish song. They were the first “bnei Menashe” (“sons of Manasseh”) to arrive in Israel since the government in November last year announced funding for the immigration of about 6,000 members of the community from the states of Manipur and Mizoram in northeast India. The community claims to descend from
‘TROUBLING’: The firing of Phelan, who was an adviser to a nonprofit that supported the defense of Taiwan, was another example of ‘dysfunction’ under Trump, a US senator said US Secretary of the Navy John Phelan has been fired, a US official and a person familiar with the matter said on Wednesday, in another wartime shakeup at the Pentagon coming just weeks after US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth ousted the Army’s top general. The Pentagon announced his departure in a brief statement, saying he was leaving the administration “effective immediately,” but it did not provide a reason or say whether it was his decision to go. The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Phelan was dismissed in part because he was moving too slowly to implement reforms to
RSS