Thirty-two dead and hundreds scarred for life. The trial of the 2016 jihadist attacks in Brussels will open on Wednesday in the Belgian capital with the draw of jurors.
This is a new trial for Salah Abdeslam, sentenced in June in France to life imprisonment for his participation in the preparation of the attacks of November 13, 2015 (130 dead in Paris and Saint-Denis).
In March 2016, the same jihadist cell, withdrawn to Belgium where it was partly formed in September and October 2015, carried out suicide attacks in Brussels, also claimed by the Islamic State (IS) group.
At the time, these jihadists had other projects in mind, including hitting Euro-2016 in France. But they act in haste a few days after the arrest of Abdeslam, in Brussels on March 18.
On the morning of the 22nd, two men blew themselves up in the departures hall of Brussels-Zaventem airport and another in a metro station in the European capital. Result: thirty-two dead and several hundred wounded.
Nine men are expected in the box, including Salah Abdeslam and his childhood friend from Molenbeek, Mohamed Abrini. A tenth, Osama Atar, leader of the cell, will be tried in his absence, because he is presumed dead in Syria.
In total, six of these ten defendants have already been convicted in the river trial which was held, for the attacks of November 13, from September 2021 to June 2022 in Paris.
“Memory Loss”
Facing the accused, now installed in a collective space, the ranks of the victims will be provided. According to the federal prosecutor’s office, more than 1,000 people have already filed civil suits to obtain compensation for damage.
This makes this trial, scheduled until June 2023 at the former NATO headquarters in Brussels, the largest ever organized before an assize court in Belgium.
“I don’t really expect a lot of answers,” Sandrine Couturier, a civil party who intends to come and face the defendants, told Agence France-Presse (AFP). “But I want to confront myself with what human beings are capable of doing, I have to accept that not everyone is good. »
Present on the Maelbeek metro platform when the suicide bomber set off his explosives in a train, this association director still suffers from post-traumatic stress six and a half years later.
“Memory loss” and “concentration problems” which resurface as the trial approaches, she explains.
Episodes of anxiety, even depression, are still very frequent for survivors and witnesses that AFP was able to interview.
Sébastien Bellin, a former professional basketball player who was to fly from Zaventem to New York on the morning of March 22, lost the use of a leg in the attack.
He says today that he feels no hatred against the authors. “It would drain the energy I need to rebuild myself,” he says.
On Wednesday, the hearing will start with the formation of the popular jury composed of 12 people. After the formation of the jury, scheduled for one day, the debates must open on December 5.