Today (Thursday) is the last day of the Brussels terror attacks trial before the jury will deliberate whether the accused men are guilty and on what counts.
In early December, the trial on the 2016 terror attacks at Brussels Airport in Zaventem and Maelbeek metro station began. Now, seven months later, the jury is finally due to deliberate.
"It has been seven gruelling months for the victims of the attacks and their relatives," Philippe Vansteenkiste, president of victims' organisation V-Europe, told Bruzz. "The trial is finally reaching a final stage, which means that they will soon be able to move on with their lives. For some, the process has helped them to cope, for others less so."
The defendants' closing speeches will take place today, but Vansteenkiste is not expecting anything new from them. "They are rather symbolic closing words meant to further draw the jury into their story, but technical novelties will not come up."
287 questions for the jury
After that, the 12 members of the jury and their 15 deputies leave for an unknown location, along with chairperson Laurence Massart, assessors and two deputies. They must completely isolate themselves from the outside world for the entire duration of the deliberations: they are not allowed any contact with relatives, and phones and televisions are also banned.
Deliberations are expected to last anywhere between two weeks and a month. Massart, however, made it clear that the intention is to finish in July. Debates and verdicts about the sentencing will take place from 4 September.
The final questionnaire for the jury to deliberate on consists of 287 questions. In a proposal submitted by Massart on Tuesday, there were 286 questions but one subsidiary question has now been added about "the requalification of participation in the activities of a terrorist organisation to conceal criminals" for accused Hervé Bayingana Muhirwa, from 14 March to 10 April 2016. His defence had asked for that requalification.
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The questionnaire covers 338 pages, but the jury does not have to answer them all as some are subsidiary questions. For example, the jury could find that Bilal El Makhoukhi is guilty of war crimes, but find him not guilty of murder and attempted murder in a terrorist context.
Additionally, the jury will have to decide whether the attacks claimed more than 32 lives, following a request to include subsidiary questions on victims who had died after the attacks if there was a causal link, such as Shanti De Corte, a young woman who was euthanised for mental suffering.
