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Wednesday, 26 June, 2019

Latest News:

Heat wave: Police in Leuven free baby locked...

Over 1.2 billion euros in fines, confiscations owed...

The number of bakeries in Belgium keeps dwindling...

Four Belgian institutions selected for Alliances of European...

Some 500 scientists discuss new particle accelerator...

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Belgium lags behind in the fight against corruption

Belgium is close to the bottom of the class in terms of preventing corruption among legislators, judges and prosecutors, according to the ...

Belgium lags behind in the fight against corruption

Belgium is close to the bottom of the class in terms of preventing corruption among legislators, judges and prosecutors, according to the 2018 report ...

Heat wave: Police in Leuven free baby locked in car

Police in Leuven were called in on Wednesday to free a baby locked in a car in the middle of the day. The 11-month-old baby was rushed into ...

Over 1.2 billion euros in fines, confiscations owed to the State

The money owed to the State of Belgium in unpaid fines and confiscations amounts to 1.221 billion euros, up from 1.05 billion in 2018, La Libre ...

The number of bakeries in Belgium keeps dwindling

Bakeries have been closing down in the past 10 years at the rate of two per month in Wallonia and closer to five per month in Flanders, Le Soir ...

Four Belgian institutions selected for Alliances of European universities

The Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB), Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (KUL) and the University of Antwerp are the ...

Some 500 scientists discuss new particle accelerator

Some 500 scientists, innovators and decision-makers are discussing a possible successor to the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) particle accelerator ...

People who don’t learn Dutch should not receive benefits, says Flemish minister

Non-Dutch speakers living in the Flemish municipalities around Brussels should not be given unemployment or social benefits, Ben Weyts, Flemish ...

Opinion

Zero tolerance or normalized sexism? How sexism became a political strategy

Last month, the Brussels Intercommunal Transport Company STIB and Plan International launched a campaign to ...

Alicja Gescinska

The flower-patterned notebook in a house of horrors

Stored away in a European Parliament office cabinet is a small, flower-patterned notebook. The pages contain ...

Samuel Stolton

Welcome to a new era of European democracy

With the next few months set to be dominated by unseemly haggling over top EU jobs, starting with the ...

Philippe Legrain

It’s the national politics, stupid

One could say the campaigns in the European Parliament elections, which are taking place this week on 23 – 26 ...

Robert Steenland

Animal welfare, a favourite issue for many politicians but forgotten after elections

With the EU elections this week, we are witnessing a plethora of references to animals in speeches and ...

Olga Kikou

Vote for 5G: securing the legacy of Robert Schuman

As in 1950, Europe today is again facing the choice of being bold and forward-looking on its future, writes ...

Abraham Liu

Fake news has taken hold in Europe: it’s time for the EU to act

It’s become a truism to accuse Russia for the spread of fake news around the world; the Kremlin has been ...

Igor Pliner

The architectural destruction of Brussels: Incompetent decision-making and the rise of ‘Brusselization’

A picture of a horribly renovated house in Brussels recently went viral on social media. Nothing spectacular, ...

Alicja Gescinska

Tackling climate change: Citizens vote increasingly green but politicians slow on meaningful action

Greta Thunberg is an unlikely instigator of a global social movement. The then-15-year-old schoolgirl who ...

Philippe Legrain

A warning for democracy, not a eulogy

‘A blow of the hammer.’ That is how Dutch writer and essayist Bas Heijne captured the sentiment prevailing ...

Alicja Gescinska

Current Top Opinions

Why did Brussels become the capital of Europe? Because Belgium starts with letter B!

9 May 1950: The French foreign minister Robert Schuman makes his famous declaration calling for Germany, ...

Philippe Van Parijs

Brussels’ abrupt population boom: fatal success?

Something must have happened in Brussels in 2000, something unpredicted and unpredictable, that abruptly ...

Philippe Van Parijs

What no government…The current state of Belgian politics and the rocky road ahead

Belgium may not have an elected federal government at the moment, but you would be forgiven for not knowing ...

Dafydd ab Iago

Belgium’s slow transition towards renewable energy: Politics, Money and Bureaucracy

December of 2017 in Belgium was one of the darkest and most sunless since records began to be kept. ...

Dafydd ab Iago

Welcome to a new era of European democracy

With the next few months set to be dominated by unseemly haggling over top EU jobs, starting with the ...

Philippe Legrain

The architectural destruction of Brussels: Incompetent decision-making and the rise of ‘Brusselization’

A picture of a horribly renovated house in Brussels recently went viral on social media. Nothing spectacular, ...

Alicja Gescinska

Become an opinion maker

Top Opinions

Why did Brussels become the capital of Europe? Because Belgium starts with letter B!

9 May 1950: The French foreign minister Robert Schuman makes his famous declaration calling for Germany, ...

Philippe Van Parijs

Brussels’ abrupt population boom: fatal success?

Something must have happened in Brussels in 2000, something unpredicted and unpredictable, that abruptly ...

Philippe Van Parijs

What no government…The current state of Belgian politics and the rocky road ahead

Belgium may not have an elected federal government at the moment, but you would be forgiven for not knowing ...

Dafydd ab Iago

Become an opinion maker

Magazine

Belgium’s lost town of Baarle-Hertog

Inside a sleepy town in the southern Netherlands you can find...Belgium Inspecting a map of Baarle-Nassau and Baarle-Hertog, you ...

Experiences over exhibitions: the changing face of art in Brussels

An explosion of digital and immersive art in Europe is making itself known in Brussels, as immersive experiences crop up across the ...

Certificate of virginity: Cultural pressure and ethical dilemmas facing Belgium’s medical practitioners

Do you remember the first time you had sex? And the time just before that, when your doctor examined your genitalia to determine whether ...

Holding the institutions to account: Brussels press corps still as relevant as ever

Both Brussels’ and Belgium's federal government have long boasted of the country's capital city being a global press centre, second only to ...

Chic, hipster and down to earth: How the Flemish quarter grew a unique Brussels community

Rue Antoine Dansaert, set in the middle of the fashionable Dansaert district, is often proclaimed as the heart of Brussels design, of ...

Meet the women on a mission to save craft beer in Belgium

As any bartender the length of the country will assure you, Belgium is the home of great beer. The drink pumps so strongly through the ...

The sustainable food revolution in Brussels: Changing eating habits and local demand

Brussels citizens eat more sustainable food year after year. A few pioneers initiated the trend some time ago and now the market is ...

Three years after the Brussels attacks: The continued threat to Belgium of returning terrorists

Hundreds of Belgians left to fight for jihadist groups in Syria and Iraq. But what happens when they return? And how big a threat do these ...

Syrian returnee stripped of Belgian nationality

A Flemish returnee fighter from Syria has been stripped of his Belgian nationality and handed a heavy prison sentence following a ruling on Wednesday by ...

Syrian returnee stripped of Belgian nationality

A Flemish returnee fighter from Syria has been stripped of his Belgian nationality and handed a heavy prison sentence following a ruling on Wednesday ...

Steve Bakelmans gets 5 years jail sentence for the rape of his ex girlfriend

Brussels has become less expensive for expatriates, annual survey shows

Bad weather affects Belgian honey

Brussels swimming pools at capacity during heat wave