Four suspects were arrested this weekend in the Netherlands in the investigation into an attempted kidnapping of Belgian Justice Minister Vincent Van Quickenborne, which implicated “the drug mafia.”
The minister, also burgomaster (mayor) of Kortrijk, addressed the inhabitants of this West Flanders city on Saturday night who participated in a municipal dance, in a video message broadcast on Sunday by public radio and television RTBF .
He said he received a phone call Thursday from federal prosecutor Frédéric Van Leeuw. “He warned me of a kidnapping project that was targeting me,” the minister said in this video message, adding that he did not want to cancel the celebrations so as not to “prove the drug mafia right.”
The Belgian federal prosecutor’s office announced on Saturday that the minister had been placed under heightened police surveillance and that three suspects had been arrested in the Netherlands. The Dutch prosecutor specified that they were three men aged 20, 29 and 48, of Dutch nationality. A fourth suspect was arrested in the Netherlands, a judicial source said on Sunday. His transfer to Belgium has been requested.
“A purely unacceptable threat”
The judicial source confirmed that an automatic weapon had been discovered in a vehicle spotted near the minister’s home in Kortrijk.
The Flemish daily Het Laatste Nieuws reported that firearms, including Kalashnikovs, and bottles filled with gasoline had been found in the suspect vehicle, registered in the Netherlands.
The minister reacted this Saturday on social networks affirming his determination to continue the fight against “organized crime”. “We will never bow to violence,” he said.
Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo denounced a “purely unacceptable threat”. “We will not be bullied by anyone,” he tweeted.
The Belgian federal prosecutor’s office explained on Saturday that it had been “informed during the last week of a possible threat” to the Minister of Justice. An investigation, entrusted to an investigating judge, “quickly indicated that this threat must be taken seriously,” he added.
The minister was placed under increased police surveillance and canceled some of his activities. The prosecution declined to provide further details of the investigation.
Source: BFM TV
