Iraqi suspected of Al Qaeda 'war crimes' arrested in Belgium

Belgian police have arrested an Iraqi immigrant suspected of belonging to an Al Qaeda cell that carried out deadly car bombings in Baghdad in 2009-2010, prosecutors said on Friday.

The man, identified by the initials OYT, born in 1979, was detained on Wednesday when police raided an address in the town of Hasselt, in eastern Belgium, on orders of an anti-terrorist judge, they said in a statement.

He was appearing in court on Friday on charges of "several murders with terrorist intent, participation in the activities of a terrorist group, war crimes and crimes against humanity" to determine whether he would remain in custody.

He is believed to have been part of an Al Qaeda cell "partly responsible for several bombings in the Green Zone of Baghdad [Iraq] in 2009 and 2010, which killed at least 376 people and injured more than 2,300," the statement said.

Among the targets of those car bombings were Iraqi government buildings, it said.

Prosecutors said the Iraqi had been living in Belgium since 2015 under refugee status and the probe against him was launched in 2020.

His arrest follows that of a 38-year-old Syrian man on March 28 who was suspected of carrying out "war crimes" in Syria for the Islamic State group.

The Syrian, too, had been given refugee status in Belgium.