The World Cup match in Qatar ended in a victory for Moroccans over Belgians.
by Jean-Pierre Stroobants (Brussels, Correspondent)
The match between Belgium in Morocco, which ended in the victory with 2-0 of the Atlas Lions over the Red Devils, was not yet finished, Sunday, November 27, when violent incidents broke out in the center of Brussels. On one of the main boulevards in the center of the city, a car has been returned, burned and projected on other vehicles, self-service scooters were destroyed, just like urban furniture.
Dozens of sometimes masked young people, some of whom sporting the flag of Morocco, gathered at the start of the second half in the Gare du Midi district. The ranks of the demonstrators quickly swollen and the spirits heated themselves as the meeting progressed. After jets of firecracker and fireworks, the fire was stuck to trash cans and thugs obviously intended to confront the police, supported by sprinklers.
Parents and educators, disappointed by this show, tried in vain to calm the minds of adolescents. “They are spoiling everything,” deplores Nordine, who came with her two sons of Molenbeek to follow the meeting on television, in a cafe in the area. Maryam, a mother, crushes a tear: “Tonight, TV is going to talk about this again, and not the beautiful victory of Morocco, which even Belgian journalists say that it is widely deserved”. USMAN, a young Belgian-Moroccan interferes in the conversation to assert that he wanted to “simply manifest his joy” but that the police prevented him from it, hence his anger and that of his friends.
“A journalist was injured in the face by fireworks. It was for these reasons that it was decided to carry out a police intervention,” said his Ilse Van de Keere side, Word of the Brussels-Capital-Ixelles police zone. Some incidents also broke out in Ghent, where a police bus was attacked.
traders feared destruction
In November 2017 already, during the qualification of Morocco for the 2018 World Cup in Russia, after a match against Côte d’Ivoire, shots of jubilation had degenerated and 22 police officers had been injured during violent incidents. Many windows had been broken and we had attended looting and real riot scenes.
The inhabitants and traders of the center of the city remembered these disorders, made possible by an insufficient police presence at the time. This time, reinforcements had been planned and the local police in Brussels worked in coordination with the federal police. The merchants feared new destruction in particular while the winter pleasures, the traditional Christmas market located not far from the places of the clashes, had just opened.
Sunday, Philippe Close, the town (mayor) of the city quickly condemned “with the greatest firmness” the incidents and assured that the police, who had received the order to quickly arrests, would intervene “firmly “. He advised not the supporters of the two teams to go to the center of the city.
At the end of the afternoon of the police were posted in various places while some scattered clashes still occurred while, in another part of the city, a few thousand people paraded against violence against women. Especially during the World Cup: many demonstrators mentioned the recent British study claiming that domestic violence increases by 26 % when the national team plays, by 36 % when it loses.