In the trial of the terrorist attack in Brussels in 2016, the first verdicts were made. At that time 32 people died, meanwhile the number of fatalities has risen.
In the trial of the Islamist attacks in Brussels in 2016, the jury found several of the ten accused guilty of terrorist murder. This was announced by court president Laurence Massart on Tuesday evening in the Belgian capital.
According to the Belgian news agency Belga, six people have been convicted of terrorist murder. Three were therefore acquitted of this charge. The verdict was reached by a 12-person jury after more than two weeks of incommunicado deliberations. The penalties will be decided in September.
Death toll increases
The terrorist attacks on March 22, 2016 at Zaventem Airport and a metro station in the Belgian capital killed 32 people and injured 340. The jihadist militia Islamic State (IS) claimed responsibility for the crime.
According to Belga, the jury also decided to hold the defendants accountable for four other people who died after the attacks – either after a long illness or by suicide. The official death toll has increased from 32 to 36.
A total of ten men have been charged with the attacks in Brussels. It is assumed that one of the ten accused has now probably died in Syria. Eight defendants in court were charged with 32 counts of terrorist murder, attempted terrorist murder of almost 700 people and involvement in the activities of a terrorist organization. The prosecution charged the ninth only with the third point.
Some of the accused have already been convicted in France
Six of the accused were found guilty in June 2022 for their part in the Paris attacks that took place just a few months earlier and claimed the lives of 130 people.
Among those convicted is Salah Abdeslam, 33, believed to be the leader of the terrorist cell responsible for the attacks. The Paris court has already sentenced Abdeslam, who was born and raised in Brussels, to life imprisonment with no possibility of parole.
In the series of attacks on November 13, 2015 in Paris, extremists killed 130 people and injured 350 others. The attacks in Paris and Brussels were engineered by the same terrorist cell, which is why six of those convicted in Paris are also on trial in Brussels.
The trial lasted seven months and was held at the former NATO headquarters. The costs are estimated at at least 35 million euros. Nearly 1,000 people attended the hearings.