18 per cent of reports about threats received by the Coordination Body for Threat Assessment (OCAD) in 2024 involved minors. Moreover, a ‘rapid radicalisation among minors’ has been recorded OCAD’s annual report published on Thursday shows. OCAD also saw more small cells and terror networks emerge in recent years.
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More and more minors investigated as part of terrorist threat reports
Colin Clapson
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The number of minors involved in plans for extremist or terrorist violence in Belgium seems to have increased in recent years, OCAD says. It is a phenomenon that can also be observed abroad. There were also several such attacks or plans for attacks in France, Sweden and Germany. OCAD notes this illustrates that young people are vulnerable to online radicalisation, but it also poses a challenge for the authorities to prevent young people from taking action.
Over the past 3 years, almost a third of those who plotted plans to launch attacks in Belgium were under 18 years old. "If we look at perpetrators identified in threat reports, minors also appear to be on the rise in 2024."
In the Common Database Terrorism, Extremism, Radicalisation Process, OCAD also detects an increase in the number of minors: last year there were about 30 minors with full status in the database. The findings are in line with what was already revealed at the end of May by the annual report of the federal public prosecutor's office: suspects in terror cases are becoming younger and younger.
Lone wolves
Most threat reports and potential perpetrators still fall under the profile of the “lone wolf”. In other words, they act alone. Yet in recent years, security services have also seen a resurgence of small cells and networks, especially within the jihadist context. These networks exist mainly online and are loosely structured, with both domestic and foreign members.
They usually involve young people, sometimes even minors, who were previously unknown within extremist or terrorist circles. Within these groups, jihadist propaganda is intensively shared. Often, a few individuals take the lead and openly express their intention to carry out an attack in due course.
Similar small cells and loose networks are also popping up in right-wing extremist circles. In 2024, several of these smaller networks and cells were again rounded up by the public prosecutor's office and the security services. Most cases involved suspects with an Islamist-jihadist profile. The vast majority of threats are made by men.
Fewer reports overall
OCAD counted 287 threat reports last year, or 13 per cent fewer than in 2023 (332). After investigation, it was found that 213 of these threats were related to extremism or terrorism. The reports came from partner services such as the prosecutor's office, the Centre for Cybersecurity or radicalisation officers.
18 per cent of the authors of these threats were minors. In threat reports, jihadist-Islamic extremism is the motive in just over half. For OCAD, one of the important observations of 2024 was the speed at which (especially) young people are becoming radicalised.
The choice of targets in threat reports was strongly influenced by the ideology of the (potential) perpetrator. In 2024, the main threats focused, in order of frequency, on: the Jewish community and Israeli interests, specifically designated individuals, the general public, political authorities, police and army, public buildings, non-believers, specific communities, prison staff and critical infrastructure.