Reported Plan to Strike Belgian Premier Prevented
Belgian police have detained three individuals accused of conspiring to carry out an assault on the nation's premier, Bart de Wever.
Prosecutors described the suspected plot as a terrorist act motivated by jihadist ideology targeting the premier and fellow politicians.
During raids conducted in the Deurne area of Antwerp, near the premier's home, investigators uncovered a potential improvised explosive device and evidence that the individuals were intending to deploy a drone.
While the prospective targets of the strike were not officially named by the prosecutor's office, Vice Premier Maxime Prevot stated that Belgium's leader was among them.
"Information of a planned strike targeting Premier Bart de Wever is deeply alarming," the deputy prime minister stated in a message on social media on Thursday.
"This underscores that we are dealing with a very real extremist danger and that we have to keep watchful," he concluded.
The three suspects taken into custody on allegations of attempted terrorist murder and involvement in the activities of a terrorist group all are based in Antwerp, per the federal prosecutors. They were born in 2001, 2002 and 2007.
By the evening of the arrests, one suspect was released, while the other suspects were undergoing questioning and expected to be presented before a court on the following day.
Legal authorities stated that the suspects were detained after a court official ordered inspections of their residences in the urban area by law enforcement backed by explosives-trained dogs.
In the course of these investigations that they found a object which appeared to be an IED, federal prosecutor Ann Fransen announced at a press conference on the day of the events.
Searches also uncovered a container of metal spheres and a additive manufacturing device, with "indications that they intended to use a drone to attach a payload", she noted.
The prosecutor disclosed that there had been 80 terrorism investigations initiated in Belgium this year - exceeding the overall count of instances in 2024.
In April, five suspects were found guilty for a previous year's plan to strike Belgium's leader while he was serving as Antwerp's mayor.
