The very first Mamma Roma restaurant opened its doors at Place Flagey in Brussels in 2005. Before long, several more would sprout up across the capital. The concept combines a rotating menu of delicious pizza (soup, antipasti and desserts are also available) with the convenience of casual, walk-up...

What do you do? For 38 years I’ve been employed as a tax expert by the federal finance ministry, in the customs division. Once a week I’m at the reception, so I’m helping trade, moving the traffic of goods forward by signing the required certificates. The rest of the week I’m out in the field,...

Renting out guest rooms on a private basis in Brussels will become subject to stricter rules, according to new laws that impose a number of obligations on property owners. Non-compliance with the new rules risks a fine of between €250 and €25,000. More than 5,000 people are thought to be renting...

A Belgian court has ruled that Michelle Martin, the ex-wife and accomplice of Belgian child killer Marc Dutroux, will be allowed to travel abroad to find a new home. Martin ( pictured ) was arrested in 1996 for helping Dutroux kidnap and rape six girls. Dutroux killed two of them and left two...

Diplomats in Brussels are facing a crackdown by the authorities after refusing to pay almost 1,000 fines. The city has nearly 1,000 outstanding traffic tickets and parking fines. Emissaries and envoys to the EU and Belgium, who have legal immunity under the Vienna Convention, have angered the...

Belgium will hire 50 extra specialists and allocate €10 million to the fight against cybercrime. Ten of the specialists will go to the Belgian Cybercrime Centre and the other 40 to the Federal Computer Crime Unit (FCCU) and the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT). CERT said there were an...

Sonja Becq of the Flemish socialist party (SP.A) presented a proposal yesterday to change the pension system by scrapping the right to a pension at 65 years in favour of the award of a pension after 42 years of work. “More and more people are agreeing with the idea that the number of years worked...

Verstraete is one half of Housestories, a company that offers furnished flats with a difference. “There are thousands of furnished apartments in Brussels,” she says, “but when you look closer, you find that few of them are high-quality. Most are either put together on the cheap or sterile and...

London-based Irishman Andrew Maxwell leads the laughs at Stand-up comedy night at Théâtre 140 on January 18. The triple billing features the UK circuit stalwart who excels in intelligently crafted travelogues that shun the usual clichés. Warming-up the evening are British Tamil former maths teacher...

The Socialist trade union has asked other public services in the capital about the presence of asbestos in their buildings. The union’s health and safety expert, Marc Duplessis, says that many public services were unable to provide an inventory of asbestos present in their buildings, despite this...