Can Boris Dilliès turn Brussels’ emergency security meeting into lasting action?

Brussels Minister-President Boris Dilliès

Place

Anderlecht

Brussels municipality where shootings were recorded during the four-day period.

Why it matters

Brussels municipality where shootings were recorded during the four-day period.

About

Anderlecht is one of the 19 municipalities of the Brussels-Capital Region, Belgium. Located in the south-western part of the region, it is bordered by the City of Brussels, Forest, Molenbeek-Saint-Jean, and Saint-Gilles, as well as the Flemish municipalities of Dilbeek and Sint-Pieters-Leeuw. Like all municipalities in Brussels, it is officially bilingual (French–Dutch).

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Place

Saint-Gilles

Brussels municipality where shootings were recorded during the four-day period.

Why it matters

Brussels municipality where shootings were recorded during the four-day period.

About

Saint-Gilles or Sint-Gillis is one of the 19 municipalities of the Brussels-Capital Region, Belgium. Located in the southern part of the region, it is bordered by the City of Brussels, Anderlecht, Forest and Ixelles. Like all municipalities in Brussels, it is officially bilingual (French–Dutch).

Official site ↗View source record ↗

Place

Molenbeek-Saint-Jean

Brussels municipality where shootings were recorded during the four-day period.

Why it matters

Brussels municipality where shootings were recorded during the four-day period.

About

Molenbeek-Saint-Jean or Sint-Jans-Molenbeek, often simply called Molenbeek, is one of the 19 municipalities of the Brussels-Capital Region, Belgium. Located in the western part of the region, it is bordered by the City of Brussels, from which it is separated by the Brussels–Charleroi Canal, as well as by the municipalities of Anderlecht, Berchem-Sainte-Agathe, Dilbeek, Jette, and Koekelberg.

Official site ↗View source record ↗

The immediate objective, according to Dilliès’ office, is to reinforce personnel and equipment on the ground and establish more durable coordination. The minister-president said the authorities must attack drug trafficking “at the root” and dismantle the system rather than stage a short-lived operation. That language acknowledges the central difficulty: Brussels already has emergency deployments, local prevention programmes and coordination bodies, yet armed groups can move between neighbouring municipalities and police zones faster than public institutions routinely align their response.

BX1 counted six shootings between Friday and Monday. The sequence began when gunfire struck a police station in Anderlecht at about 23:40 on Friday; nobody was injured. Further incidents in Saint-Gilles and Molenbeek wounded several people, while a bullet entered a Saint-Gilles home without injuring its occupant. On Monday evening, automatic gunfire again erupted near Place des Deux Bancs in Saint-Gilles, where customers in a nearby pizzeria had to take cover, Mayor Jean Spinette said. The Brussels prosecutor’s office said investigations were continuing to identify and arrest those responsible. It has not publicly established that all six cases involved the same network.

The concentration of incidents has political significance beyond the individual investigations. BX1 reported that Brussels had reached 65 shootings in 2026, matching the total for the whole of 2025. Because recent figures may be provisional and definitions can differ, the comparison should be treated as an indicator of acceleration rather than a final annual statistic. What is firmly established is that gun violence has repeatedly affected residential streets and, in the Anderlecht case, a police building.

Responsibility is divided across Belgium’s institutional layers. The Brussels Region coordinates prevention and security policy through the minister-president and safe.brussels; a February 2026 regional decree formally assigns that portfolio to Dilliès. Mayors retain public-order responsibilities in their municipalities, while six local police zones serve the 19 communes. Federal authorities control the federal police, much of organised-crime investigation, criminal law and the wider justice apparatus. Prosecutors and investigating judges, meanwhile, make judicial decisions independently. A Regional Security Council can align those actors and exchange information, but it cannot erase their separate legal powers or command every service from one centre.

Dilliès, who took office in February during the 2024-2029 regional parliamentary term, points to measures already launched by his government. His office says €68 million was allocated to security and prevention in 2026, and that recruitment is under way for a regional drugs commissioner expected to begin coordinating a broader strategy at the end of September. The government has also decided to end shared electric-scooter services from 1 January 2027, citing, among other concerns, their use in criminal escapes. Wednesday’s meeting will test how these measures connect to immediate enforcement rather than simply adding another layer of administration.

Two political frames are now competing. Dilliès and the federal government stress joint responsibility, sustained coordination and a combination of policing, prosecution and prevention. Federal Justice Minister Annelies Verlinden

Socialist local and federal representatives place greater emphasis on resources. Spinette has asked that Brussels receive exceptional support comparable to Antwerp’s anti-drug response. Federal opposition party PS has requested a joint meeting of the Chamber’s Interior and Justice committees, where MP Ridouane Chahid wants Quintin and Verlinden questioned about police staffing, prison-based criminal direction and customs controls at the Port of Antwerp. This is not merely a partisan disagreement: it is a dispute over whether the principal deficit is coordination, operational capacity or the distribution of federal resources.

For residents and businesses in the affected neighbourhoods, the practical issue is whether visible security improves without simply displacing dealing and violence into adjacent streets. The regional council may agree reinforcements, shared priorities or longer-term information arrangements, but its value will depend on decisions that can be measured and sustained. The next milestones are any communiqué following Wednesday’s meeting, the prosecutor’s planned Friday briefing, progress in the six investigations and the regional drugs commissioner’s expected arrival in late September. Until then, the relationships between the shootings, the perpetrators and any specific trafficking networks remain unresolved.