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It had been known for a while that far-right militants from Belgium are undergoing training in weapons skills and war techniques in Eastern Europe. Now, we have identified a few of them (1/11) https://www.hln.be/binnenland/met-echte-wapens-deze-keer-zo-trainen-leden-van-schild-en-vrienden-in-buitenlandse-militaire-kampen~a6bc68b4/
Two are members of the controversial youth organization ‘Schild & Vrienden’, of which the leader is an MP for Vlaams Belang facing prosecution already. It was this documentary that first exposed their extremism (2/11) https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/nl/2018/09/05/pano-wie-is-schild-vrienden-echt/
At that time, they had members in the far-right political party Vlaams Belang, but also in the more moderate right-wing N-VA (where they even served as a bodyguards of former state secretary for Asylum Policy and Migration Theo Francken, center) and the centrist CD&V (3/11)
Here’s Schild & Vrienden member Stijn L. (26) showing his many tattoos, including a ‘black sun’ on his chest — a symbol often confused with Norse/Viking origins, but actually designed in Nazi Germany (4/11)
Stijn L. spent 5 years in the French Foreign Legion, after which he was trained as a ‘Private Military Contractor’ by the ‘European Bodyguard and Security Services Association’ (EBSSA). A company based in Serbia and reportedly influenced by Russia’s GRU (5/11)
In Belgium, Stijn L. appears to be flagged as a “potentially violent extremist” in the database that security services started a few years ago as a watch list for Islamist foreign terrorist fighters. Nowadays, it also contains about 50 far-right extremists (6/11)
A second Schild & Vrienden member (exposed in 2018 already for posing with a rifle on the far-right version of the Flemish flag) trained in Eastern Europe is Koen S. (30). In 2018, he was a candidate for Vlaams Belang in local elections (7/11)
Here, Koen S. can be seen (3rd from the left) in a ‘graduation picture’ of the course ‘Close Quarter Battle’ at the European Security Academy in Poland. That was founded, it is told, by the guy who also trained the bodyguards of the late Muammar Gaddafi (8/11)
Finally, there’s also Silvy van B. (39), who went several times to the European Security Academy. She works as a tattoo artist, was caught already with nazi symbols in her catalogue, and served as local council member for Vlaams Belang a few years ago (9/11)
It’s not illegal for Belgians to be trained by legal companies such as ESA in Poland. It offers its services to many legitimate, professional customers. But if it’s wise to let them train radicalized citizens of any kind is questionable (10/11)
In this respect, it’s worth to read about the elaborate investigation of Bellingcat into ESA’s training of Azov Battalion members — the Ukrainian neo-nazi militia that was too extremist even for the Trump administration to get military support (11/11) https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2018/08/30/ukrainian-far-right-fighters-white-supremacists-trained-major-european-security-firm/
