Police in Belgium have arrested three people suspected of plotting an attack on the country’s prime minister, Bart de Wever.
The alleged plot was described by prosecutors as a “jihadist-inspired terrorist attack” on the PM and other politicians.
Authorities found a suspected improvised explosive device and evidence the suspects were planning to use a drone during searches in Deurne, Antwerp, close to the prime minister’s private residence.
The intended targets of the attack were not named by the prosecutor’s office, but Deputy Prime Minister Maxime Prevot said that de Wever was among them.
“The news of a planned attack targeting Prime Minister Bart de Wever is extremely shocking,” Prevot wrote in a post on X on Thursday.
“It highlights that we are facing a very real terrorist threat and that we have to remain vigilant,” he added.
The three individuals who were arrested on suspicion of attempted terrorist murder and participation in the activities of a terrorist group all live in Antwerp, according to the prosecutor’s office. They were were born in 2001, 2002 and 2007.
As of Thursday evening, one of the individuals was released, with two others still being questioned and expected to appear in court on Friday.
Federal prosecutors said they were taken into custody after a judge ordered searches of their homes in the city by police officers backed by explosive sniffer dogs.
It was during these searches that they discovered a device which “bore strong resemblances to an improvised explosive device,” federal prosecutor Ann Fransen said at a press conference on Thursday.
Searches also uncovered a “bag of steel balls” and a 3D printer, with “indications that they intended to use a drone to attach a payload,” she added.
Fransen said that there had been 80 terrorism investigations opened in Belgium this year – more than the total number of cases in 2024.
In April, five people were convicted of a 2023 plot to attack De Wever while he was serving as Antwerp’s mayor.
