Belgium to demand migrants sign up to ‘European values’

Belgium is set to enact controversial legislation that will force all non-EU migrants wishing to live in the country to declare their support of “European values” or see their residency claim rejected.

The Belgian parliament is expected to pass the proposal to introduce a “newcomers’ statement” in the next few months, according to a spokesperson for Belgium’s secretary of state for asylum and migration, Theo Francken, who drafted the plan.

People moving to Belgium for over three months would have to sign the statement which includes a pledge to prevent and report any attempts to commit “acts of terrorism”.

The statement would not apply to asylum seekers and students,.

“Many people are coming [to Belgium] from countries with other values,” Francken’s spokesman Laurent Mutambayi said.

“If they want to build their life here in Europe [we have] no problem with that but they have to sign this statement that they accept our values,” he add

He added that those who are not deemed to be integrating sufficiently will not be allowed to stay in the country.

However, Orbit, a Belgian organisation working with migrants warned that the proposal was discriminatory and would fuel prejudice towards migrants.

 “The integration process can start when you have the residence and not when you sign a document that you will integrate. It’s really a bad thing as a welcome for people,” Orbit spokesperson Didier Vanderslycke said.

He said that forcing would-be residents to sign a declaration accepting gay rights or gender equality suggested that these values were not held by immigrants, and would hence deepen prejudice against them.

Tensions are already mounting in Belgium following last month’s suicide attacks on a Brussels airport and a metro train that left 35 people dead.

Extreme-right groups have threatened attacks in the Molenbeek neighbourhood in the capital on Saturday and community leaders fear that its predominantly Muslim young people will fight back.

“They don’t trust the police and they aren’t going to take it,” said Fouad Ben Abdelkader, a teacher in the neighbourhood.

Last Sunday, hundreds of black-clad demonstrators shouting Nazi slogans disrupted a memorial at Brussels’ Bourse square for the victims of the 22 March suicide attacks.