Deadly attack in Belgium ignites fierce debate on failures of deportation policy

The alleged attacker who killed two Swedish soccer fans in Brussels this week before he was shot dead by police resided in Belgium illegally and had been ordered to leave Belgium three years ago. He never left.

In a country that has been repeatedly rocked by extremist attacks, the government’s inability to deport the 45-year-old Tunisian national and prevent him from carrying out the attack is sparking a fierce political debate.

Many questions remained unanswered as Sweden’s Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson traveled to

Brussels on Wednesday to attend a ceremony paying tribute to the victims and meet his Belgian counterpart Alexander De Croo.

How was a man who was on police files, thought to be radicalised and being sought for deportation, able to remain on Belgian soil? How did he obtain a semiautomatic rifle and launch such an attack?

Put on the backfoot by political rivals quick to condemn the inadequacies of Belgium’s deportation policy, De Croo stressed that orders to quit the Belgian territory need to be better enforced. “An order to leave the territory must become more binding that it is now,” he said.