European intellience services under fire for poor communication

It has emerged that the US’ Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) tipped off Dutch investigators that Belgian police were seeking the two brothers who carried out the recent terrorist attacks in Brussels. The tip-off reportedly came less than a week before the attack. The authorities in Belgium reportedly sought Ibrahim el-Bakraoui over his criminal background, while Khalid el-Bakraoui was wanted for his role in “terrorism, extremism and recruitment.” It has emerged that Turkey deported Ibrahim to the Netherlands in July 2015 after Turkish police arrested him near the Syrian border. The Netherlands has said that his name did not appear on any of their blacklists therefore he was released. The attacks, and the information that is now emerging about those involved, have raised serious questions over communication failures among Europe’s intelligence services.

The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) tipped off Dutch investigators that two brothers were being sought by Belgian police less than a week before the pair blew themselves up in the Brussels attacks, a Dutch minister has said.

Ard van der Steur, the Dutch interior minister, was responding to questions from legislators about Belgian brothers Ibrahim (“Brahim”) and Khalid el-Bakraoui, named as two of the bombers who killed 35 people and injured more than 340 in coordinated attacks on the Belgian capital last week.

The attacks have raised difficult questions about the failures of Europe’s intelligence services to communicate with each other.

Ibrahim was deported to the Netherlands from Turkey in July 2015, a month after being picked up by Turkish police near the Syrian border. The Netherlands said that when he arrived his name did not appear on any blacklists so he was not detained. Why he was not deported to Belgium is unclear.

“On 16 March, the FBI informed Dutch police … that both brothers were sought by Belgian authorities,” the minister wrote in a letter to Dutch MPs.

Van der Steur said the FBI told the Dutch authorities that Ibrahim was sought by the Belgian authorities for “his criminal background”, while Khalid was wanted for “terrorism, extremism and recruitment”.

One week after the deadliest attack on Belgian soil since the end of world war two, the search for at least one suspect, known as “the man in the hat”, continues. An unidentified man, wearing a black hat and cream jacket, shown in CCTV footage walking alongside the two airport suicide bombers, has not yet been found.

At first this man was thought to be Fayçal Cheffou, a Belgian citizen. He was arrested over the attacks last week but released by Belgian authorities on Monday for lack of evidence. Olivier Martins, representing Cheffou, said on Tuesday that phone records apparently showed his client had been home at the time of the attacks.

Brussels airport could reopen to the public on Wednesday but it will need time to get back to normal after last week’s bombings, a spokeswoman has said.

On Tuesday about 800 airport staff took part in a drill to test temporary check-in arrangements, but the final decision on reopening was to lie with the police, army and civil aviation authorities.

If security requirements are met the international airport could offer a limited service from Wednesday afternoon but only for a fraction of the passengers who normally use the facility. An announcement is expected later on Tuesday or early Wednesday.



A spokeswoman said that, as a best case, the airport could reopen with a maximum capacity of 20%. But a complete return to normal, following the blasts in which 15 people died, could take months.

“The priority is security,” Arnaud Feist, chief executive of Brussels airport, told Le Soir. “Our interim structure cannot absorb the normal volume that we had before the attacks.” He said the maximum number of passengers in the short-term could be 1,000 an hour.

“Although the structures of the building are intact, everything inside must be reconstructed from the air conditioning to the ticket desks. It will take months. It is obvious that we would like to restart very quickly, because our employees are also at stake – 20,000 people work at the airport.”

Photographs taken one day after the blast and published on Tuesday by Het Nieuwsblad indicated the extent of the bomb damage: smashed windows, collapsed ceilings, debris-strewn floors, a buggy abandoned in the rush to escape the carnage.



About 23.5 million passengers passed through Brussels airport last year, which has grown rapidly with the expansion of low-cost flights and as a hub connecting other European airports to African destinations.



On Tuesday the Brussels metro was running a partial service, with several stations closed, including Maelbeek, scene of the most deadly attack last Tuesday.

Meanwhile questions over the handling of the attacks and their aftermath have reopened Belgium’s bitter regional and linguistic divisions. Yvan Mayeur, the socialist mayor of Brussels, a majority French-speaking city, blamed the Flemish authorities for allowing more than 200 far-right demonstrators to trample on a memorial to the victims at Place de la Bourse, after travelling in from Flanders.

“It is not the image of Brussels that has been tainted by Sunday’s events ... it is Flanders that has come to taint Brussels with its extremists.” The mayor also said he had no confidence in Belgium’s interior minister, Jan Jambon, who is a member of the NVA Flemish nationalist party.

Belgium’s justice minister, Koen Geens, called for a truce in the inter-regional politicking. “Now is not the time to fight one another. As far as I know, the enemy is in Syria.”