Belgian vice PM says some celebrated Brussels attacks

In the days following the terror attacks in Brussels, street celebrations broke out in several places in Belgium, the county’s vice prime minister says.

Jan Jambon, a rightist politician, said this in an admission that Belgium has a jihadism problem. One of the Europe’s smallest countries, Belgium is Europe’s biggest per capita source of jihadists fighting in Syria and Iraq. In February, Jambon revealed Belgium’s intelligence services have flagged 451 citizens as jihadists.

But, Jambon says, racial profiling of jihadists is ineffective. He also says that jihadists hail from various backgrounds, not only from poor environments, “including doctors, lawyers, and common criminals.” Only one in six jihadists comes from a poor home in Belgium, he says and urges better pan-European cooperation on terrorism.

— JTA