Spanish expats describe 'Brussels Lockdown' during top-secret terror raids
Tuesday, November 24, 2015 @ 9:31 AM
SPANIARDS living in the Belgian capital have broken their night-long silence imposed by the 'Brussels Lockdown' and told reporters what it felt like living under military siege in a western European city.
The world's media was told just before operations started at 19.00hrs last night (Sunday) not to report on any activity in Belgium until otherwise advised, since a metropolitan-wide swoop on terror suspects had been meticulously planned by Intelligence and security services.
One word out of place could mean the potential killers might have got wind of the operation and either fled or launched an attack similar to those in Paris just over a week ago.
Spanish people living in Brussels have just revealed that they were ordered to stay indoors with the lights off, not to give details of their location or activities on any social networks, and even to stay away from the windows.
Armed Forces filled the streets of the capital and the locations and positions of security services were kept top-secret.
Major TV and radio channels stopped broadcasting and no news programmes were aired last night.
In fact, Brussels turned into a ghost town and was completely cut off from the world.
Raids were carried out on 19 properties in the districts of Molenbeek – where a number of terror suspects were arrested last Saturday – Jette, Schaerbeek, Anderlecht, Woluwe-Saint-Lambert, Forest, and Charleroi.
A total of 16 suspects have been arrested, one of whom was injured when police opened fire after the person in question rammed a patrol car and attempted to drive off.
Read more at thinkSPAIN.com