Youth in Antwerp were planning attack, says prosecutor

A group of eight teenagers in Antwerp were arrested on Wednesday, having admitted that they were considering carrying out terrorist attacks in the city, according to the federal prosecutor’s office.

The investigation into a group of radicalised youths registered phone calls and messages on social media in which the suspects, aged between 16 and 19, talking about planning to go and fight in Syria.1genericpills.com Originally, police considered the communications to be merely boasting.

That changed when the group came in contact with Hicham Chaïb in Syria. Chaïb, formerly a confederate of Sharia4Belgium’s Fouad Belkacem in recruiting Syria fighters, went himself to Syria in 201, and rapidly moved up the ranks of IS. In the meantime, he was sentenced in absentia to 15 years by a court in Antwerp.

The contact with Chaïb convinced the group to begin making more concrete plans. According to De Standaard newspaper, quoting an unnamed source, possible targets were Antwerp Station and far-right Vlaams Belang politician Filip Dewinter. But, plans, said the source, were still “in the brainstorm phase”.

Four of the eight arrested have been formally accused of taking part in the activities of a terrorist group.

Photo: Photoshot/BELGA

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