Three men reportedly linked to al-Qaeda will go on trial in Belgium in March. The trial of Tunisian Tarek Maaroufi and two other unidentified men, from Iraq and Morocco, will open at a Brussels court on March 22, prosecution spokeswoman Lieve Pellens said. Maaroufi was already sentenced to six years in prison in October for activities linked to Islamic extremism. He was described at that trial as the "spinal column" of a radical Islamic cell in Belgium. According to Le Soir newspaper, Maaroufi and his two co-accused are suspected of belonging to a terrorist cell linked to al-Qaeda in the northern port city of Antwerp. The three men had forged links with similar cells in Afghanistan, Iraq, Italy, Pakistan and Syria. "We haven’t established a link with al-Qaeda but we have confirmed contacts with Italy and Spain and, for Maaroufi, with Islamist circles in London," Pellens told AFP. Belgium did not have specific anti-terrorism legislation in place at the time of the trio’s alleged activities in Antwerp — January 1999 to January 2002. Instead they are charged with forgery including making false passports. They could face up to five years in jail, although the term could be increased on the basis of previous convictions, Pellens said.
| Does that mean they don't have any laws against criminal conspiracy? No organized crime statutes? |
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