Belgium arrests foil suspected jihadist ‘terrorist attack’

From AFP via Yahoo News and the Irish Independent

Belgian police on Thursday arrested seven people suspected of supporting the Islamic State (IS) group and plotting a “terrorist attack”, prosecutors said.

Almost all the suspects are ethnic Chechens, and three of them possess Belgian nationality, prosecutors said in a statement. The office’s statement said all seven allegedly belonged to a group of “strong supporters” of the Islamic State extremist group.

The office said in a statement that the suspects had not yet selected a precise target . . . “There was talk of the NATO buildings, but at the moment those plans didn’t seem very concrete,” a spokesperson told Belgian newspaper De Standaard. “Possible charges are attempted terrorist assassination, participation at the activities of a terrorist group and preparation of a terrorist attack,”

A spokesman for the federal prosecutors’ office, Eric Van Duyse, told AFP that “they apparently intended to target an institution located in Belgium” and had been “actively searching for weapons”.

The police raids took place in the city of Ghent and the smaller towns of Roeselare, Menen, Ostend and Wevelgem.