On the 8^th March 2023, the Belgian Federal Police let the public know that it remained “vigilant” after on the 7^th March it received an email containing a terrorist threat directed at the Brussels underground.

“We remain vigilant at this point, as we should” stated one of the spokespersons from the Belgian Federal Police, in charge of maintaining underground security. The police conducted a thorough search of the underground during the night, but did not find anything “suspicious”. In his turn, the spokesperson of the Brussels civil prosecutor – who took over the investigation – mentioned that at that point, the risk of a “real attack” is believed to be “improbable”.

A spokesperson from the Belgian National Crisis Centre – the institution responsible with maintaining security in case of a terrorist attack – said at the time that the terrorist threat is under assessment, but confirmed that a terrorist attack was highly unlikely. Nevertheless, the threat was carefully looked into by the US Embassy in Brussels, which issued a warning for the US citizens, recommending that they should “be careful when travelling around Brussels”.

And, on the 27^th March 2023, the Belgian Federal Police arrested eight people, after having conducted investigating actions all over the country. According to a communique issued by the Federal Prosecution, the arrests were the result of two investigations. In the statement made public by the institution, it highlighted that “the two cases are related, however they need to conduct more investigations to see to what extent”.

The searches that took place during the course of the first investigation, when the police in Anvers arrested and interviewed five people took place in Merksem, Borgerhout, Deurne, Molenbeek, and Eupen. At least two people were suspected of having planned a terrorist attack on the Belgian territory.

During a separate investigation, three more people were arrested in Zaventem and in the Bruxelles, Molenbeek and Schaerbeek municipalities. They were all suspected of having planned a terrorist attack. According to the prosecutor that is assigned to the case, the target of the attack is unknown and no further information will be provided about the results of the above-mentioned searches.

CUTA (Coordinated Unit for Threat Analysis), the governmental body that monitors terrorist threats in Belgium, let the public know that the general level of threat is 2 (out of four), adding that the authorities “have everything under control at this time”, and the situation was closely monitored.

According to information provided by the Belgian radio station RTBF, the cases in Brussels and Anvers initially had two young men suspected of violent radicalism; the investigations pointed out that they were connected to potentially dangerous individuals that were in their entourage.

We must highlight the fact that the above-mentioned arrests took place after members of a terrorist cell, suspected of having planned and committed – seven years before, in times of peace – terrorist attacks on Belgian territory were undergoing trial in Belgium. The defendants were charged with murder, attempted murder, affiliation with terrorist organisations and involvement in terrorist acts. As we very well know, on the 22^nd March 2016 there was a terrorist attack on the international Airport in Brussels and on the Belgian underground – Maelbeck – station, which resulted in the death of 32 people. Furthermore, over 900 were injured in the attack.

Among those who were accused of having organised the terrorist attack is Salah Abdelslam – the only survivor of the Islamic State extremists, who, in 2015 hit Bataclan theatre in Paris, the city’s cafes and the National Stadium. He was sentenced to life in prison, without parole, because of the atrocities he had committed in the French capital.

In this context, it is worth mentioning that it is highly likely that certain terrorist groups could try to commit new attacks in various countries in Europe, including in Belgium.

We should not overlook the fact that so far, there was a significant number of terrorist attacks in Belgium, the main threat being posed by the Daesh extremists. Previous incidents included attacks against civilians and against the Belgian security forces.

• On the 29^th May 2018 two police officers and a civilian that transited the area were killed in a terrorist incident that took place in Liège.
• On the 10^th November 2022, a police officer was killed and another was wounded during a terrorist incident in Brussels.

Belgian authorities are successfully countering various terrorist attacks plans making arrests. We must not forget that Brussels accommodates many international institutions (the EU, NATO) and government buildings that belong to foreign embassies, which could be considered as highly important. For example, we must highlight that the British Counterterrorism Police provides information and advice with regard to maintaining the level of security abroad, which should be done in case of a terrorist attack. We must take all this into account because it seems that there is a high global terrorist threat coming from groups or individuals motivated by the Iraqi and Syrian conflicts, or motivated by extremist ideologies.