daily news, uk weather, business news - onl Antwerp race riots militant charged
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
(Filed: 30/11/2002)

A Muslim firebrand accused of inciting two days of race riots in Antwerp was charged yesterday with conspiracy to foment disorder, destroying vehicles, and assaulting a police officer.
Abou Jahjah, 31, a Lebanese-born extremist who once fought for Hizbollah, was blamed for stirring up ethnic conflict in the Belgian city's North African quarter after a Moroccan teacher was murdered on Tuesday by a white dockworker said to be mentally ill.
The Belgian prime minister, Guy Verhofstadt, vowed to put a stop to the open lawlessness of Abou Jahjah's militant organisation, the Arab European League. "The league is trying to terrorise the city," he said.
The authorities were shocked by the targeted nature of vandalism this week. Flemish pubs and black-owned businesses in the Borgerhout district were attacked, but shops displaying AEL stickers were spared.
Belgium's liberal media agreed yesterday that the country's experiment with tolerant multiculturalism had totally broken down.
The Flemish newspaper De Morgen said: "For a decade, the immigrant quarters of this country have turned into reservoirs of frustration, even hate. They have found a voice in Abou Jahjah."
Abou Jahjah rejects assimilation, demanding segregated schools and self-governing, Arab-speaking ghettos.

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