The man suspected of killing two Swedish football fans and wounding another in a terrorist attack in Brussels on Monday night has died after being shot by police.
Belgium’s interior minister, Annelies Verlinden, told the broadcaster VRT that an automatic weapon found on the “neutralised person” was the same as that used during the attack that killed two Swedish men, one in his 60s and one in his 70s.
Belgian authorities have confirmed that the man shot outside a cafe in the Schaerbeek area near the city centre was the suspect.
Police opened fire during the arrest, said Eric Van Duyse, a spokesperson for the Belgian prosecutors’ service. Earlier on Tuesday morning, a search took place in a house near the scene of the attack but the perpetrator was not found.
Belgium’s national crisis centre said a witness called police to say they had spotted the suspect shortly after 8am in Schaerbeek.
“The police went to the scene,” it said. “During the intervention, shots were fired by police and the suspect was shot dead. Emergency services, upon arriving at the scene, attempted to resuscitate the suspect. He was transferred to hospital where he was pronounced dead at 9.38am.
“A weapon and a bag of clothes were found in the cafe. The Brussels prosecutor’s office is investigating the shooting. In the interest of the investigation, no further information can be given at this time.”
The suspect, a 45-year-old Tunisian calling himself Abdesalem Al Guilani, claimed in a video on social media that he was a fighter for Allah.
The Belgian justice minister, Vincent Van Quickenborne, said the man had sought asylum in Belgium in November 2019 and was known to police in connection with people-smuggling and illegal residence in Belgium. His asylum application was rejected, it has been reported.
The Swedish foreign office said two men were killed in the attack. The older man was from Stockholm, they said, and the younger man lived abroad. A third Swedish man, also in his 70s, was injured and remains in hospital. The relatives of the deceased have been notified, said a spokesperson for Sweden’s department of foreign affairs.
The suspect is understood to have spent time in Italy. A photograph on his Facebook profile, which has now been taken down, showed him in Genoa’s Piazza della Vittoria in 2021.
He was also traced and identified by police in Bologna in 2016, according to Italy’s security service, which is investigating potential links between the man and others in Italy.
The Swedish prime minister, Ulf Kristersson, said the attacker had previously visited Sweden and that it was clear the shootings were directly targeted at the country.
“Two Swedes were shot dead in cold blood,” he told a press conference in Stockholm on Tuesday morning, adding that a third Swedish citizen had been seriously injured and was in hospital. “Everything indicates that it was a terror attack aimed at Sweden and Swedish citizens just because they are Swedish.”
Kristersson, who plans to travel to Brussels on Wednesday, called for Sweden and the EU to have “a better check on our borders” and to bolster security.
“It is today difficult to find the words but it is not difficult to find force to meet the threat,” he said. “This is a time for more security; we can’t be naive.”
Media reports aired amateur videos from Monday evening showing a man firing several shots near a station using a large weapon. The gunman, who was wearing a fluorescent orange jacket and using an automatic rifle, fled the scene on a scooter after the incident.
The attack has shaken the Belgian capital, where the security threat level was raised from 2 to 4, the highest level. The threat level was reduced to 3 on Tuesday. People were asked to be vigilant and not travel unnecessarily while the man was still at large.
Belgium was hosting Sweden in a Euro 2024 qualifying football match on Monday evening. The game was abandoned at half-time and crowds evacuated shortly before midnight.
Kristersson said his thoughts were with “innocent people who have died”, the injured and their relatives, as well as Sweden fans in the stadium who had travelled to Belgium for the match. The flag outside the Swedish parliament was flown at half mast on Tuesday.
The Belgian prime minister, Alexander De Croo, called the shooting a brutal terrorist attack, while the French president, Emmanuel Macron, said Europe had fallen victim to another Islamist attack.
“We are thinking of the victims of this cowardly attack,” Macron wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “We share the shock with our Belgian and Swedish friends.”
On Monday, the prosecutor’s office said there was no evidence the attack was related to the conflict in Israel and Gaza. But on Tuesday a spokesperson said such a link was being explored.
“We initially said that there would be no connection with the events in Gaza, but we have since established that he has shared a number of expressions of support for the Palestinian people on his social media,” said Eric Van Der Sypt of the federal prosecutor’s office. “So this may have played a role.”
The public prosecutor’s office said “all possible avenues” were being investigated. “The investigation will have to reveal his precise motives,” it said.
De Croo told a news conference: “Last night, three people left for what was supposed to be a wonderful soccer party. Two of them lost their lives in a brutal terrorist attack. The perpetrator targeted specifically Swedish supporters who were in Brussels to attend a Red Devils [the Belgian team’s nickname] soccer match. Two Swedish compatriots passed away. A third person is recovering from severe injures. My most sincere condolences to the loved ones of the victims of the cowardly attack in Brussels.”
The Swedish football team manager, Janne Andersson, said in a press conference: “This feels completely unreal. What kind of world do we live in?”
Sweden’s captain, Victor Lindelöf, said: “It’s terrible. I don’t know what to say.”
The shooting comes at a time of heightened security concerns in some European countries linked to the Israel-Hamas conflict. France is deploying 7,000 extra troops on to its streets after a teacher was fatally stabbed on Friday in an attack that Macron condemned as “barbaric Islamic terrorism”.
