It seems even the most idyllic countries in our imaginations – cities with the fairytale flower and art lined canals of calendar shots – are now plagued by violence fueled by gangs and drugs.

Brussels, Belgium, is one such place, as is her sister city, the seaport of Antwerp.

Normally you don’t think of any European city – except maybe Paris – as a place of running gun battles, “random” shootings, or explosions, but they surely are making their way across the continent. Last month I did a piece on the burgeoning problems in Sweden which have caused the government there to put the kibosh on their permissive immigration system.

It turns out that when you open the doors to a whole different set of values, and you drop the age of “criminality” – in other words, the age you can be charged as an adult – bad things proliferate.

Like warnings from gangs. Forget the horse head in bed or box of dead fish.

Across the EU, members of the bloc are so worried about the explosion in drug trafficking and gang violence fueled by drug wars that the head of their law enforcement said it’s literally a threat to EU democracies.

Rule of law in European democracies is at risk of being undermined unless EU leaders significantly ramp up their response to a boom in drug-related crime, the head of the bloc’s law enforcement agency told POLITICO.

Europol chief Catherine De Bolle said Europe had replaced the United States as the primary target market for international drug traffickers, and that arrivals of drugs were expected to spike over the next two years amid a glut in production.

She says that Europe has become “predominant” over the US as far as the international drug trade is concerned.

…Yet De Bolle said Europe’s worsening problem with drug-linked organized crime isn’t just in Central and Eastern Europe. It’s plaguing affluent hubs in western and northern Europe as well, from Antwerp in Belgium to Rotterdam and Amsterdam in the Netherlands, to Hamburg in Germany and small ports in Spain and the coastal cities of Sweden.

…In Belgium, the seat of EU institutions, the killing of an 11-year-old girl in drug-related violence earlier this year in Antwerp prompted a similar outcry, while police last year uncovered a plot to kidnap the country’s justice minister, Vincent Van Quickenborne, leading to beefed-up security for him. “Very concerning but predictable,” reacted Bart De Wever, the right-wing mayor of Antwerp, at the time.

Alarm bells are also ringing in Sweden, Spain and Germany, where De Bolle said the Port of Hamburg had become a key destination for traffickers. The problem for EU leaders is that in each of these hot spots, traffickers are gradually chipping away at rule of law by corrupting logistics workers, taking over IT systems, infiltrating local government and even the courts and police, she said.

“We discovered a harbor where everyone was corrupted. If we abandon certain certain areas you can have really tricky situations where the criminals take over,” said De Bolle, declining to name the harbor.

The 11 yr-old girl in the article above was killed as bullets were sprayed through what looked to be a garage door but turned out to be a make-shift apartment.

The incident happened in the Antwerp district of Merksem around 6:30 PM on Monday evening. “We received reports a garage door had come under fire” explains Antwerp police’s Willem Migom. “Police found bullet marks and cartridge cases”.

The garage door shielded a living space and not a garage. “There were people behind the door” explains Migom. “An 11-year-old child was seriously injured in the shooting. The child later died in hospital of her injuries”.

The little girl lived in Antwerp, a Belgian harbor city and major port which is becoming known more for it’s drug imports and the associated carnage that comes with those that for anything else. Perhaps it’s even the harbor city the EuroPol head was referring to when she said they’d discovered one where “everyone was corrupted” by the drug trade. It certainly sounds like a contender.

Europe’s got a problem’ — Drug violence grips Belgium’s second city
Antwerp is grappling with bombings, shootings and a record influx of cocaine.

…Home to Europe’s second-largest cargo port, Antwerp has become a major entry point for drugs, especially cocaine coming from Latin America, and the turf wars have spilled into its streets. In 2022, there were 81 drug-related shootings and explosions in Antwerp, according to numbers shared by the city with POLITICO, and another 25 in the first five months of this year, including a shooting in January that killed the 11-year-old niece of an alleged drug criminal.

…In an interview in his office overlooking Antwerp’s majestic central square, the mayor described the threat posed by drug smuggling as “much bigger” than the 2016 terrorist crisis. The violence in his city, he said, is only the tip of the iceberg, as criminals re-invest their illicit money into the formal economy, spreading their influence in countries across the Continent.

“Europe’s got a problem and should wake up,” he said.

Record numbers
De Wever ascribed Antwerp’s importance to the drug trade to its location — connected with the North Sea, just a 40-minute drive away from Brussels, and close to some of the biggest German industry hubs. “We are the most important port city for all trade coming from Latin America,” he said. “We’re the first port of call. But for those piggy-backing [to smuggle], that’s incredibly useful.”

Sister city Brussels, the capital of both Belgium and the European Union, is not immune to the strife, and has seen some very trying times recently. The nature of it has some people not only worried about the violence itself, but wondering if a portion of it is also being targeted at specific nationalities.

In October, an illegal Tunisian immigrant opened fire with an automatic weapon at restaurant-goers on a quiet street.

…The attack began at 19:00 (17:00 GMT) on Monday, when a man opened fire with an automatic rifle on the Boulevard d’Ypres – north of the city centre.
Videos shared online showed a man on a scooter, dressed in an orange fluorescent jacket, pull up and start shooting passers-by.
He then chases people into the hallway of an apartment building to gun them down. Four gunshots can be heard.
Shortly after the attack, he filmed himself admitting to the killings.
In the video, the Arabic-speaking gunman refers to fighting for God and says he has killed Swedish people.

Police later tracked him down after being tipped off to his whereabouts, shot him, and he died at the hospital.

Last night? Another what – at first – seemed to be random shooting on a major Brussels shopping thoroughfare.

Here we go again.

Shooting on a major shopping street in the home of the EU, Brussels, Belgium, multiple people injured; Suspect on the loose. pic.twitter.com/j3awG7ExUZ

— Stan Voice of Wales (@StanVoWales) December 7, 2023

“Random” until they released the identities of the injured.

🇧🇪SHOOTING IN BRUSSELS LEAVES 4 PEOPLE INJURED, INCLUDING SWEDISH MEP🇸🇪

A shooting took place this Wednesday evening, around 7:30 p.m., on avenue de la Toison d'Or, in downtown Brussels.

Condition of the injured is currently unknown.#bruxelles #Brussels #Belgium pic.twitter.com/apYfOWISGC

— Attentive Media (@AttentiveCEE) December 7, 2023

Yet another Swede?

SWEDISH MEP’S ASSISTANT INJURED IN BRUSSELS SHOOTING
An assistant to a Swedish MEP sustained a gunshot wound during a shooting on a popular shopping street in the Belgian capital yesterday evening.

…The woman who is an employee of the European Parliament is receiving treatment after the attack in which it was reported four people were injured.

What a coincidence.

Are Sweds being deliberately targeted? This is a few times now that victims just happened to be Swedish.

— Hat Tip (@hattipireland) December 7, 2023

Again, Sweden’s gangs and those who are overrepresented when arrested for gang violence/drug offenses have the “right-wing” government going on offense.

…Sweden has been a European hotspot for gang-related shootings and bombings for several years. But recently the violence has shifted beyond low-income, vulnerable urban areas and police say one reason is that gang members are increasingly targeting rivals’ relatives.

Detectives suspect some of the latest violence has been organised by criminal leaders based in other countries, including Turkey and Serbia.

…Swedish police do not currently map gang members’ nationalities, but research for the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention in 2021 showed young people born in Sweden to two parents from abroad were overrepresented as suspects in murder cases and robberies.

The right-wing coalition government, elected in September 2022, believes the rise in gang violence in recent years is directly connected to Sweden’s earlier immigration policies. Until 2016, it had one of the most generous asylum laws in Europe.

…The government wants to make it harder for immigrants from outside the European Union to get social benefits, and to make preschool compulsory for children with two foreign parents in some areas, in order to improve Swedish-language skills.

Earlier this year, it became an offence to recruit children to participate in criminal activities. Stop-and-search zones are set to be introduced in early 2024 and ministers want to double prison sentences for offences including gun crimes and explosions.

If countries outside the EU are believed to be organizing the gang activities inside Sweden to even include retributions and hits, is it too much to imagine them sending instructions elsewhere to tap known Swedish citizens living in those areas as a subtle-not-so-subtle threat to the new government?

How horrific.

And how plausible.