Tensions between the Turkish and Kurdish communities in Ghent continue to rise. A Kurdish bakery was destroyed in the night from Wednesday to Thursday. Police were able to arrest 22 rioters, half of them minors. Mayor Mathias De Clercq (Open VLD) has decided to introduce a ban on gatherings.
Laura Moens, Pieter Van Maele
Yesterday at 2:18 PM
Tensions between the Turkish and Kurdish communities in our country have been running high for days. In Ghent, calls were made via social media to take to the streets again in the night from Wednesday to Thursday. The police were therefore present en masse in the streets.
“Despite our efforts, we were unable to prevent another commercial property of a Kurdish entrepreneur from being destroyed,” a spokesperson for the Ghent police told Het Nieuwsblad. It concerns the Kurdish bakery Sila in Frans van Ryhovelaan. “Our massive presence ensured that we were able to respond quickly. We arrested 22 people.”
Half of those arrested are minors. Police also found weapons such as knives and a Molotov cocktail. “They were clearly looking for a way to disrupt public order and commit legal crimes.”
Gathering ban
The Ghent police say they have information that shows that the tensions are not over yet. “We continue to receive reports about young people of Turkish origin who are ready to intervene,” says the police spokesperson. “But people of Kurdish descent would also want to come to Ghent from abroad. We hope everyone realizes the consequences. No resident of Ghent with Turkish or Kurdish roots should allow himself to be incited to harm others and the city.”
Mayor Mathias De Clercq (Open VLD) decided on Thursday to introduce a ban on gatherings for groups of ten people or more. “We want to do everything we can to avoid further escalation and to restore calm,” said De Clercq.
The ban on gatherings comes into effect on Thursday evening – from 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. – and applies to ten known places where young people can gather. These are locations that are being targeted and where large groups of young men have often gathered in recent days.
The police are also authorized to carry out systematic identity checks. This means that the police can stop anyone on the street to check them.
In the night from Tuesday to Wednesday, a café on Bevrijdingslaan in Ghent was destroyed by a group of Turkish men. Anti-Kurdish slogans were also shouted at that time. Last week, the Ghent police also had to break up a fight at Dok-Noord. On Monday, a group of about fifty masked men appeared at the gate of the city hall, just after the city council. They carried Turkish flags and chanted slogans against the Kurdish Workers’ Party PKK, which is considered a terrorist organization by the EU, among others.
The tensions between the two communities are certainly not limited to Ghent. On Sunday evening there were physical confrontations in Heusden-Zolder and Houthalen-Helchteren. The outbreak broke out when a number of cars returned from the Kurdish Spring Festival and drove through the Turkish neighborhood with PKK flags and portraits of Abdullah Öcalan. Fighting then broke out on Monday during a demonstration of Kurds in front of the European Parliament in Brussels. On Monday evening, a building belonging to the Gray Wolves – an extreme right-wing Turkish nationalist organization – was set on fire in Wezet, in the province of Liège.
