Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo has defended the measures taken by the Consultative Committee on Wednesday, urging his fellow politicians to "stop pointing fingers".
"All the parties that are asking me questions today, except three, are represented in Codeco. So please, let's stop pointing fingers. This is not the way to conduct a crisis policy. That's when you have to take responsibility," De Croo told the house on Thursday, Belga News Agency reports.
The latest measures, which will go into effect on Saturday, will once again see changes in rules for mask-wearing, events and teleworking. These broad measures were announced as an effort to prevent the need to lock down, something which De Croo stressed again on Thursday.
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"8.6 million Belgians have been vaccinated (...), which means that there is no containment today. We are not doing the same thing at all! We made the choice of prevention and protection, the choice not to close. Last year at this time, we had no choice but to close."
De Croo also stressed he remained in favour of persuading people who have not yet been vaccinated against Covid-19 in the face of arguments in favour of compulsory vaccination for the general population.
"The method of compulsory vaccination, only four countries use it: Indonesia, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Micronesia," he observed. "And I don't know of any European colleague who uses this as a lead. Convincing is more effective than forcing", he concluded, judging the motivations of those not vaccinated to be "complex".
