After a football match, a group of young people from Brussels took the train from Lede station to return to the capital, explains the East Flanders prosecutor’s office. The fight quickly broke out. The train attendant and the driver decided to stop the train at Aalst station and call the police. This arrived in numbers. Knives were confiscated and an injured person was taken to hospital, the mayor said. Later, three other protagonists who had initially fled, also went to the hospital for treatment.
Ever more violent attacks against SNCB controllers: welcome to the Brussels-Liège line, the most dangerous in the country
The injured will be questioned and video surveillance images analyzed, added Christoph D’Haese. The prosecution specifies for its part that one of the hospitalized victims only suffered minor injuries. “This is a 17-year-old from Brussels who is not in danger of death. He will still be unable to work for a week.”
The prosecution confirms that a man on the train had a knife. He had already fled when the police arrived. Around 11:30 p.m., another fight involving around thirty people occurred on the station square in Aalst. One injured person has been recorded. He reportedly suffered a broken arm. The prosecution is examining whether there is a link between the two brawls. “However, they are well linked to young Brussels residents near a station,” we note.
Cases of aggression, harassment and intimidation against passengers but also against controllers are recurrent on SNCB trains. A situation which can lead to post-traumatic stress, as evidenced by Angiolina, an SNCB train attendant, who had a bad experience last year.
”A young girl was being harassed by a group of young people on the train where I was on duty. I went to them and asked them for their transport tickets. None had a train ticket or identity document. One started shouting at me and another tried to tear off my cap. Their behavior really disturbed me”, she explains. “I called the security services but the young people finally came down before the planned intervention. I returned to my service under stress. I still leave for work every morning with a smile, but I don’t want to go through that kind of situation again. In a civilized and free society, such episodes should not occur.”
15 attacks per day at SNCB, Stib, Tec and De Lijn
The number of cases of assault has reached an unacceptable level. In 2023, no fewer than 5,598 cases of assault have been recorded against staff members of the four public transport operators, an average of 15 per day. This corresponds to an increase of around 1.5% compared to 2022, which already represented a record year in terms of the number of attacks.
About a quarter of assaults involve physical violence. In other cases, it involves insults or threats. Whatever the type of attack, employee victims never escape unscathed. In 2023, 892 agents were absent following an assault, which represents 27,926 days of incapacity.
