Brussels remains under Belgium’s highest terrorism alert level, with soldiers and heavily armed police in the streets, after authorities warned of a possible imminent threat to the capital.
Subway service is suspended in the city until at least Sunday afternoon, and people have been warned to avoid gatherings just over a week after a wave of ISIS attacks in Paris killed 130 people.
Specific reasons for the extraordinary alert in Brussels, which began Friday night, weren’t disclosed, but Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel said Saturday that authorities had reason to suspect possible attacks in more than one location.
“We are talking of a threat of several individuals with weapons and explosives, to launch acts, maybe even in several places at once,” Michel said, evoking chilling similarities with the Paris attacks that hit restaurants, a rock concert and the area outside a sports stadium.
At least one man suspected of involvement the Paris violence, Salah Abdeslam, a French citizen who grew up in Belgium, is still at large.
‘A serious and imminent threat’
The Belgian Interior Ministry’s crisis center cited “a serious and imminent threat” when it announced that Brussels’ terrorism alert level was rising to 4, the country’s highest. Outside of the capital, the alert level for the rest of the nation was unchanged.
Officials are expected to reevaluate the threat Sunday afternoon, Michel said, raising the possibility that the disruption to a city that’s popular with tourists and is home to many European Union offices could spill into Monday.
The government advised the public to avoid places in the capital where large groups gather — such as concerts, sporting events, airports and train stations — and comply with security checks.
Michel said the authorities’ main objective is to reduce the number of large events so police officers can be freed up to secure Brussels. A top tier soccer game that was due to be played 50 miles outside the capital was canceled because of the need for police inside the city.
Security forces flood city
By late Saturday evening in Brussels, most bars were closed or were in the process of closing. Fewer people than usual were out on the streets, but they weren’t deserted.
Armed security officers wearing camouflage were on patrol and positioned in front of metro stations. The city center remained quiet early Sunday.
The alert suggests authorities “have something specific and credible at the intelligence front pointing them in the direction that there may be a terrorist plot in the works,” CNN terrorism analyst Paul Cruickshank said
“It also suggests they don’t have a handle on it, that they don’t know where these plotters are or where they’re coming from,” he added.
The U.S. State Department advised Americans to be cautious.
Manhunt for suspect
Authorities in Belgium have carried out a series of security raids in the past week related to the Paris attacks, looking in particular for Abdeslam, the 26-year-old suspect who’s still on the run and described as dangerous.
The increased threat level over the weekend, however, appeared to go well beyond the manhunt for Abdeslam, who authorities last set eyes on in the hours after the Paris attacks.
French police stopped him and two other men in a car heading toward the Belgian border, but let them go because he hadn’t yet been connected to the massacres in Paris.
French authorities have said the Paris attacks were organized in Belgium. Abdeslam and several other suspects have strong ties to Brussels, notably its suburb of Molenbeek, that has a history of links with terrorism plots.
Abdeslam and his older brother, Ibrahim, who blew himself up at a Paris cafe during the deadly rampage, both hailed from Molenbeek. So did Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the suspected ringleader of the attacks who authorities say was killed in a police raid near Paris on Wednesday.
Belgian arrested in Turkey
Investigators are still trying to gather a full picture of who played what role in the shootings and bombings across Paris.
Adding to the complex picture, Turkish authorities arrested three people with suspected ties to ISIS, including a Belgian man who they believe was in contact with the Paris attackers, a Turkish official said.
Ahmet Dahmani, 26, a Belgian national of Moroccan descent, was arrested at a hotel in Antalya, CNN Turk reported. Two other suspects, Syrian citizens Ahmet Tahir, 29, and Mohammed Verd, 23, were arrested after they traveled from Syria to meet Dahmani, authorities said. The two were going to transport him to Syria, authorities said.
In France, investigators are puzzling over the DNA of the third person who was killed during the major police raid Wednesday that targeted Abaaoud, the suspected ringleader.
Two of the dead — Abaaoud and one of his female relatives, Hasna Ait Boulahcen — have been identified. But the DNA of the third person, who is believed to have detonated a suicide device, doesn’t match anyone on police records, according to CNN affiliate BFMTV.
