New phase in drug terror in Belgium: also figures from ‘the upper world’ danger
After an unprecedented summer of violence in the streets of Antwerp, Belgium seems to have entered the next phase of drug terror since this weekend. Were the persecutors who threatened each other with shootings and explosions and now walk in imitation of the upper world. On Sunday, it announced that “a serious threat” emanates from the federal drug environment against Justice Minister Vincent Van Quickenborne (Open-VLD). He and his family have been taken to an undisclosed location.
The Belgian Public received a week of information that concretely happened. The neighborhood in Kortrijk where Van Quickenborne lives was made permanent by the police at that time.
A wave of violence is plaguing Antwerp: Leaders in the coke trade used to come from the Netherlands. That changes’
Last Friday morning, the minister’s neighbor raised the alarm when an original car with a Dutch registration number blocked her garage door. In the car were a Kalashnikov and bottles of petrol. Presumably the occupants realize that they could become and flee in panic with another car.
Advanced cameras
The police were able to trace it with the help of advanced cameras on Saturday and in the night from Friday to The Hague and Leidschendam, three Dutch suspects aged 20, 29 and 48 were arrested. Belgium has requested their extradition. according to the newspaper The last news a fourth suspect is on the run. It would be about performers. Whoever gave the order must show further investigation.
Because tension straps were also found in the car, it is suspected that the minister must be kidnapped, with the possible aim of exchanging him for leaders from the drug circuit who are currently in prison. It is a practice that was also broadcast in the 1990s by movements such as the FARC in Colombia and the ETA in the Spanish Basque Country.
The confirmed weeks showed that also in the Netherlands the threat from the underworld transport. Princess Amalia and Prime Minister Rutte according to The Telegraph have additional security. threats have been taken very seriously since the murder of lawyer Derk Wiersum (2019) and last year of journalist Peter R. de Vries. In Belgium it is the first time that a concrete one is threatened by the drug mafia.
One reason may be that since he took office as Minister of Justice in 2020, Van Quickenborne has made a spearhead of the fight against drug criminals in Belgium. At the end of last year, for example, it signed a treaty with the United Arab Emirates that makes it possible to unpack and deliver suspects who are hiding there. In September, he promised to double the number of people involved in combating drug crime in the port of Antwerp.
Cracked cryptophones
At the beginning of 2021, the drug environment already took a heavy blow when the Belgian justification managed to crack the received SKY cryptophones and intercept 1 billion messages. Hundreds of suspects were arrested and detained. In the Netherlands too.
Many large organizations were dismantled as a result of that mega-crack. In the gap created smaller groups have jumped. Earlier, National Drugs Coordinator Charlotte Colman told NRC that the hierarchy is also changing as a result. Where previously in the Netherlands, the Belgian strings were pulled over that role. The errand boys from the past are given the opportunity to work their way up in the organisation. The occurrence of so many Dutch patterns in Belgium.
It remains to be seen as to the intention of the recent increase in drug violence in Belgium. ‘Thief’ and ‘200’ were recently sprayed with graffiti on various buildings in Antwerp. It may indicate that a large batch of cocaine has been lost and that someone now has to pay the price.
In a Facebook post, Minister Van Quickenborne wrote from his safe house that he feels strengthened by the threat in the belief that we must keep fighting. The normal feels cornered. That feeling is right. In our democratic constitutional state we will never give in to violence. Never.”