Belgium and Netherlands to collaborate on terrorism, airspace

The Belgian and Dutch governments have pledged to strengthen the ties that bind the two as neighbours, with cross-border co-operation on a number of issues, including fire-fighting, radicalisation and terrorism, airspace and embassies.

Representatives of the two governments met on Wednesday in The Hague and signed agreements on four main issues.

From mid-2017, the countries will take turns in patrolling the joint airspace of the Benelux, using fighter planes to react to any terrorist threat coming from civilian aircraft. Luxembourg, the third member of the Benelux union, has no fighter fleet, but the ambassador to The Hague co-signed the agreement all the same. Protection against a threat from military aircraft is handled at Nato level.

Interior ministers for the two countries agreed on a plan to co-operate on the use of fire-fighting helicopters in severe fires such as occurred when the Kalmthout heath caught fire in May of 2011. Dutch helicopters joined in to fight the blaze. In the future, the Netherlands will provide all material and personnel; Belgium will be required to reimburse only the real costs of the operation.

From the middle of next year, the two countries will share the use of the offices of the Belgian embassy in Kinshasa. They also pledged to increase co-operation in the areas of energy and taxation.

Belgium and the Netherlands are already leaders in the European policy to fight radicalisation of young people, and the two governments pledged to work closely together on the issue. Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte took the opportunity to congratulate Belgian prime minister Charles Michel on the success of the operation to break up a terrorist cell in Verviers in January, in which two suspected terrorists were killed.

“This was one of the most successful preventive operations of the last quarter,” Rutte said, calling it “a top performance”.

photo: Belgian prime minister Charles Michel (left) and his Dutch counterpart Mark Rutte in The Hague yesterday