Belgium's Justice Minister Vincent Van Quickenborne announces his resignation during a press conference following the October 16 attack in which two Swedish citizens died ahead of a Euro 2024 qualifying football match, in Brussels on October 20, 2023. (Photo by Hatim Kaghat / Belga / AFP)
Brussels: Belgian Justice Minister Vincent Van Quickenborne announced his resignation on Friday, four days after a Tunisian migrant living illegally in the country killed two Swedish football fans in Brussels.
He told a news conference that Tunisia had in August last year sought the extradition of Abdesalem Lassoued and it had not been followed up.
"It's an individual, monumental and unacceptable error," he said, according to the Belga news agency. "The magistrate in question did not follow up this demand and the dossier was not treated," he said.
"I am not looking for any excuses. I think it's my duty" to resign, he said.
"This new information coming from the prosecutors hits me deeply as I have done everything possible to improve the judicial system".
The 45-year-old attacker was fatally shot in a police operation on Tuesday.
Official documents showed Lassoued had lodged asylum applications in Norway, Sweden, Italy and Belgium. He had stayed in Belgium illegally after his bid for asylum was rejected in 2020.
French authorities meanwhile have arrested a suspect over the Brussels stabbings, a source close to the case said on Friday.
A man was arrested Thursday in the western Loire-Atlantique region, the source said.
