At a press conference held on Friday morning the Federal Judicial Authorities have given more details about the suspect that is being held on suspicion of stabbing to death a police officer in the Brussels municipality of Schaarbeek on Thursday evening. A second police officers was also injured in the attack that took place near to Brussels North Railway Station at around 7:15pm.
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Police officer’s killer had been radicalised
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The man that is being held is 32-year-old Yassine M. from Evere (Brussels). The Federal Judicial Authorities’ Eric Van Der Sypt (photo above) told the press conference the suspect spent time on the deradicalisation wings of Ittre (Walloon Brabant) and Hasselt (Limburg) prisons between 2013 and 2019.
He had however been sent to prison after having been convicted of theft and violent robbery and not for terrorism offences. After having completed his sentence Yassine M’s deradicalisation process was followed up by the deradicalisation services of the City of Brussels and the Francophone Language Community.
Police officers that witnessed the attack in which a second policeman was also injured report that Yassine M. shouted “God is great” in Arabic before launching the knife attack.
Meanwhile, the terror threat analysis group OCAD says that the terrorism threat level in Belgium will remain at Level 2. This means that a terrorist attack is not considered likely at the moment.