ID card confiscation advocated for young Syria-bound Muslims

The mayor of Vilvoorde will tonight recommend that young Belgian Muslims seeking to fight in Syria have their ID cards confiscated, preventing them from travelling, De Standaard and Het Nieuwsblad report. Hans Bonte (pictured) will put his proposal to his counterparts from Antwerp and Mechelen during a discussion on the radicalisation of young Muslims in Belgium. According to Bonte, who was informed that one youngster killed and another wounded in Syria were from Vilvoorde, there is no indication that the number of young radical Muslims wanting to fight in Syria is on the wane. Candidates were getting younger, he added. “We need to act pre-emptively to keep these young people in the country,” he said. He therefore suggests that local authorities confiscate the ID cards of young people who openly want to join a country at war, for a period of up to a year. “This will make it much more difficult for them to leave the  Schengen area,” he said. The preventive measure is already in place Germany and is being considered in the Netherlands.