Brussels airport

Brussels airport is getting back to normal, after the terrorist explosions of 22 March. Today it was a special day. The TV channels have shown the repaired departures hall and interviewed some of the checking-in staff.  It was very moving to see how motivated they are. That´s a great response to the forces of darkness and madness.

But the security procedures that have been implemented today were not smart. Passengers had to wait for two or more hours outside the hall before being screened and let in. That created big crowds and lots of anxiety. Some missed their flights.

That´s an outdated way of doing things. Passengers should be allowed to proceed as usual. This is a major airport and cannot be controlled as a provincial airport in some remote place of India. At the outside doors and in the hall the police or other type of security agents could be present with sniffer dogs. They would detect anything suspicious in any piece of luggage. And they would let it go smoothly and safely for everyone else. 

Today in Brussels

We had a very dramatic day in Brussels. The bombs at the airport and in the subway, at the beginning of the working hours, have shaken everyone. They had a major political and economic impact. But they will not make us become less tolerant. From where I stand, I can say that people have shown a lot of restraint. They were certainly deeply shocked. However, they have not fallen into any kind of xenophobic reaction or racist mood. That basically means that the terrorists have been able to hurt all of us but they cannot change our way of life, they will not win. We, here in Brussels, are used to a very diverse city and will continue to appreciate that diversity. That´s the world of today. Theirs is a world of a very distant and barbaric past. 

Men and diamonds

Eight men have shown, last night, that diamonds are not just girls’ best friends. These men love them too. They dressed for the occasion, with clothes roughly cut as police uniforms, and rather inelegantly cut through the chicken wire that surrounds part of the Brussels airport perimeter and drove in two cars to the footsteps of a commercial airliner bound to fly to Zurich. This was a scheduled flight, ready to take passengers and also a few boxes containing many shining stones.

The fellows took the stones and left the area through the same hole in the wire. The catch’s worth is estimated at 50 million dollars. Not bad for a five-minute job. 

All that happened at 20:00 hours, not in the middle of the night. At the international airport of Europe’s capital.

Fortunately, they did it for the beauty of the stones. Imagine they were a terrorist group intended at attacking the airliner and a couple of VIP passengers…

One should feel very concerned.

 As for the airport authorities, they should also feel very embarrassed. 

To be frank, they do not seem to be getting the message. Or at least, they pretend to ignore its gravity. They tell us there are three types of police forces at the airport, so we should consider ourselves safe. But that is exactly the point. When we have different forces in charge of bits of the security of a key facility there is also a serious risk of poor or no coordination among them. In addition, there is too much concern about passenger control and too little about perimeter security. Lack of resources cannot be an acceptable explanation. It is just that the emphasis is too much on checking if I carry any soft cheese – I love Camembert – and not enough on men crazy for diamonds.