The Belgian federal prosecutor’s office indicated on Wednesday, September 28, that the police – including special units – had carried out, in the early morning, a dozen searches in Flanders as part of an investigation into the preparations for an attack by people close to the extreme right. Six individuals were arrested. It is not known who their target was, but according to a press release from the judicial authorities, the group is suspected of “wanting to carry out a form of armed resistance against the government, without having already determined a concrete target or a date for taking action”.
The operations carried out in seven localities, including Antwerp and Ghent, resulted in the death of a 36-year-old man, killed during an exchange of fire with the special units of the federal police in Merksem, a district of Antwerp.
Hatred of immigrants, Jews, the state
The federal prosecutor’s office provided little information on the victim, Yannick Verdyck, who presented himself on social networks as a dealer in precious metals, a collector of weapons, and a follower of sports shooting. Very prolific, he regularly expressed his sympathies for the extreme right and his hatred of immigrants, Jews or the state, and pleaded for the establishment of a military dictatorship. His last message, dated September 26, was celebrating the victory in the Italian elections of Giorgia Meloni’s Fratelli d’Italia (post-fascist) party.
According to the daily The morningjustice has been targeting, for several months, Verdyck and some of his relatives, all known as “preppers”, survivalists, or “collapsologists”, convinced that the current world will collapse and that it is appropriate, according to one of the dogmas of this movement, of “planning and anticipating rather than undergoing”. Which supposes, therefore, arming oneself to defend oneself and one’s family. In order to survive the supposed apocalypse which threatens, it was necessary, according to Verdyck, to obtain weapons. For this, he advised, one can obtain a license in a shooting club and thus establish relations with people capable of providing it easily.
According to the judicial authorities, the police seized, in Merksem, a hundred weapons in total, a large quantity of ammunition and various military equipment. Investigators also visited locations where the man and one of his friends handled weapons, drones and communications equipment.
This is the first time that the Belgian services have directly confronted a threat combining right-wing extremism and survivalism.
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