More than a thousand Belgian traffic police are threatening to go on strike for over a month, Het Laatste Nieuws and De Morgen wrote on Tuesday.
The reason for their discontent is the sanction imposed on one of their colleagues for having fired a warning shot when he and another policeman were attacked.
The Minister of the Interior Pieter De Crem (CD&V) should receive the strike notice on Tuesday. This will allow 1,100 members of the traffic police to take action between November 29 and January 2. The SLFP union is not saying much regarding disruptions to road users. "Action can take various forms," its president Vincent Gilles emphasised.
The officers want to protest about a disciplinary procedure set in motion against one of their colleagues by a federal police chief.
This officer had fired a warning shot during an incident in Hainaut. According to the inquiry, the shot was fired legally because the officer and his partner were being threatened by ten thieves in a motorway rest area, but a reprimand was nevertheless added to the policeman's file.
The sanction was justified by the fact that the man apparently fired at the ground and not into the air. "Ridiculous," the SLFP responded. "He ought to be congratulated, not punished."
The Brussels Times
