Abdeslam raid: why did the police wait until 10am?
Speaking in an interview with the commercial television network VTM’s ‘Faroek’ programme. Mr Geens said this is a question that requires an answer from the Federal Judicial authorities. Mr Geens added that the laws governing property search had formed a “serious handicap” to the investigators.
In Belgium no properties can be raided between 9pm and 5am. According to Mr Geens, the security services had received information on the evening of Sunday 15 November that Salah Abdeslam was hiding out at an address in the Brussels municipality of Sint-Jans-Molenbeek. However, as it was after 9pm they were unable to raid the house.
Meanwhile, the Francophone public broadcaster RTBF says that it has learned from a reliable source that Salah Abdeslam was able to escape on the morning of Monday 15 November due to a removal that was going on in the street. He either hid in the car of the person that was moving or in a piece of furniture.
Street too busy?
The question still remains as to why the police waited until 10am to raid the house. Several newspapers quote the street being too busy as the reason for the delay. However, this has not been confirmed.
When interviewed in VRT Radio’s morning news and current affairs programme ‘De Ochtend’ Mr Geens would not make any comment about the timing of the raid. However, Mr Geens did elaborate on the comments he made yesterday evening on VTM.
"In the programme I was to comment on the question of whether raids should be allowed between 9pm and 5am. I only said that it would be better if that were the case and that consequently I have put proposals to facilitate this in the case of terrorism cases to parliament and to the government. I have no further comment to make on the issue”.