Leaked EU reports damn Belgian airport security

Belgian opposition parties have leaked classified EU reports which indicate that authorities “seriously” neglected airport security over the past five years.

The reports, published by the Ecolo and Green parties on Wednesday (13 April), cover the “air-side” of Belgium’s five airports - the secure zones accessible to passengers after they check in and to airport staff.

The bomb at Brussels airport on 22 March exploded in the pre-check in area that is accessible to the general public.

But the revelations have prompted calls for Belgium’s transport minister, Jacqueline Galant, to resign prior to a parliament hearing on the issue on Thursday.

The first European Commission study was carried out in June 2011 by two EU officials who interviewed Belgian aviation safety staff in Brussels and visited Liege airport.

The second study was carried out in March 2015 by the same two EU experts, who also visited Antwerp airport.

The 2011 report found Belgium “non-compliant with serious deficiencies” in five areas, such as monitoring of foreign airlines and monitoring of cargo screening procedures .

It found Belgium “non-compliant” in three other areas, such as staff security training and urged authorities to “swiftly take appropriate corrective actions.”

But the 2015 report said Belgium was still “non-compliant with serious deficiencies” in five areas and “non-compliant” in three areas.

One of the “serious” problems was related to “explosive detection systems” that “were not regularly monitored at several airports.”

Written one year before the 22 March terrorist attack, the report said Brussels airport had deficiencies on “surveillance, patrols and other physical controls, protection of passengers.”

Galantgate

In what Belgian media has dubbed Galantgate, the minister on Wednesday defended herself by saying she had no knowledge of the EU reports and had not received a “formal request” to take corrective actions.

Belgian prime minister Charles Michel on Thursday also told MPs that the commission's reports were sent to two civil servants at the aviation authority only.

"These reports were therefore not communicated to the government, which discovered them in the press," he said, adding that he wanted full "clarity" on how they were overlooked.

But at a press conference in Brussels the same day the Green and Ecolo parties published another document that cast doubt on Galant’s statement.

The document, an internal email from Galante’s top civil servant, Laurent Ledoux, to the minister dated December 2014 said: “There are serious deficiencies in Belgium concerning aviation security.”

It also urged her to recruit more security staff or to hire outside consultants.

“Minister Galant visibly has a problem with the truth, and it’s not the first time,” Green party MP Kristof Calvo said.

The commission reports also cast doubt on Michel’s statement.

They say that when EU experts did the inspections in 2011 and 2015 they were accompanied by between six and 10 Belgian officials, whose names they list, on each occasion.

Monitoring

The EU commission said on Thursday it carries out on average 35 air-side airport security reviews a year in the bloc’s 28 member states.

“We’re doing this to make sure weapons and explosives can’t get on board an aircraft,” a commision spokesman said.

“If an airport shows shortcomings these have to be addressed by the national authorities and the commission also monitors whether this is implemented.”

He declined to comment on the content of the EU reports for “security reasons.”

Commission statements on the subject also go against each other.

On 23 March, the day after the Brussels attacks, a commission official told press that Brussels airport "was not provoking any particular headache" in terms of security.

Not a failed state

Galant has held her post since October 2014.

Ledoux, her top official, resigned from his post on Wednesday and accused her of treating her staff in the manner of the “Gestapo” - Nazi Germany’s secret police.

Galant’s liberal MR party is part of a ruling coalition with the centre-right CD&V, the liberal Open VLD, and the Flemish nationalist N-VA parties.

The 22 March attacks had earlier prompted Belgium’s interior minister (N-VA) and justice minister (CD&V) to offer their resignations. But Michel (MR) said he needed them to help manage the security crisis.

Michel last week also defended Belgium’s reputation abroad.

"It took us a few months to arrest Abdelslam, it took more than 10 years to get Bin Laden," he said, referring to Salah Abdelslam, a terrorist fugitive who had been hiding in Brussels, and Osama Bin Laden, the mastermind of 9/11.