Suspected Plan to Strike Belgian Prime Minister Foiled
Belgium's law enforcement have taken into custody three individuals allegedly involved in planning an assault on the country's premier, Bart de Wever.
Prosecutors labeled the alleged plot as a terrorist act motivated by jihadist ideology targeting the premier and other elected representatives.
During searches conducted in Antwerp's Deurne district, in proximity to the prime minister's personal dwelling, investigators discovered a suspected IED and evidence that the individuals were intending to use a UAV.
While the intended targets of the assault were not officially named by the federal prosecutors, Deputy Prime Minister Maxime Prevot confirmed that de Wever was one of them.
"Reports of a premeditated strike targeting Premier Bart de Wever is profoundly disturbing," Prevot declared in a message on X on Thursday.
"It emphasizes that we are confronting a serious extremist danger and that we have to keep watchful," he concluded.
The three individuals taken into custody on charges of terrorism-related attempted murder and engagement in the operations of a jihadist network all live in the Antwerp region, per the prosecutor's office. They were born in three different years between 2001 and 2007.
By late Thursday, one person was let go, while the remaining two were under interrogation and scheduled to face a judge on Friday.
Legal authorities said that the accused were arrested after a magistrate authorized searches of their dwellings in the urban area by officials backed by explosive sniffer dogs.
Throughout these raids that they found a item which appeared to be an IED, legal representative Ann Fransen announced at a media briefing on the day of the events.
Investigations also found a "bag of steel balls" and a 3D printer, with evidence suggesting drone-based payload delivery, she added.
The prosecutor stated that there had been 80 terrorism investigations initiated in the country in the current year - exceeding the total number of investigations in last year.
During the spring, five suspects were convicted for a scheme last year to attack De Wever while he was holding the position of Antwerp's mayor.
