Belgium machete attacker was Algerian with criminal record

Officers check the identification of a man near the police headquarters in Charleroi in Belgium following the machete attack.

Soon after the attack, Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel wrote on his twitter account: “I strongly condemn the attack in Charleroi”.

A man who attacked and wounded two policewomen with a machete in Belgium was an Algerian national known to police for criminal offences but not terrorism, prosecutors said on Sunday.

According to RTL, the attacker was an illegal immigrant and had been given two orders to leave Belgium. The government didn’t immediately confirm the reports.

PHOTO: Police secure the area around a police building following a machete attack in Charleroi, Belgium, Aug. 6, 2016.

Meanwhile, in the city of Liege, 95 kilometres east of Brussels, a man was spotted wielding a machete early Sunday, the Belga news agency reported.

The attacker, who shouted “Allahu Akbar” (God is greatest) during the assault, was shot by police and died of his injuries in hospital. He was shot and killed by police after the attack, which took place in Charleroi, about 50 kilometers south of Brussels. A police spokesman said: “The investigation will have to show why the man staged the attack, and whether he maybe had mental problems”.

Belgium has been on high alert since the suicide bombings in March, claimed by Isis extremists, that killed 32 people in Brussels.

Belgian prosecutors said yesterday that the man, whose initials were given as K.B.

It was also confirmed that two police searches were carried out in Charleroi on Saturday night but the information will remain undisclosed for security reasons.

He spoke to reporters following an emergency meeting with top Belgian law enforcement officials on Sunday morning. Numerous perpetrators of the November 13 carnage in Paris that killed 130 people were also residents of Belgium.

Belgian police have carried out dozens of anti-terror raids since the attacks in Paris.

Prime Minister Charles Michel, who broke off his holiday after the attack, has urged people to remain “constantly vigilant” but “keep a cool head”.