Brussels police shut down hard-right, nationalist gathering featuring Orbán, Farage and Braverman

A Brussels gathering of hard-right, nationalist European politicians was disrupted on Tuesday after police moved in to try to force its shutdown.

Transcript

00:00 Police in Brussels attempted to shut down a gathering of hard right nationalist European

00:07 politicians. The National Conservatism Conference had just kicked off with Brexit Party founder

00:13 Nigel Farage addressing the audience when a police officer ordered it to stop.

00:18 The authorities have decided to shut off the event and I`m here to signify you the decision.

00:22 So, I have the papers here and I`m here to enforce the decision. So, it`s a decision

00:27 of the burgomaster, the mayor to shut off the event. So, it is - the motivation lies

00:34 within and you have different articles that explain the decision.

00:40 The decision was taken by Emir Kir, the mayor of Saint-Joste-en-Nord, a municipality in Brussels.

00:47 One of the reasons was the fear of a counter-protest organized by anti-fascist groups. Police surrounded

00:55 the venue and prevented anyone from entering, including keynote speakers such as member

01:00 of the European Parliament Patricia Chagnon and the leader of the French political party

01:05 Reconquête, Eric Simon.

01:24 Police decided to stay inside the venue, allowing the conference to continue. Belgian Prime

01:28 Minister Alexander de Croix has condemned the police intervention as unacceptable. Hungarian

01:34 Prime Minister Viktor Orban and former Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, who were

01:38 both among the speakers, also weighed in with criticism.

01:42 We were supposed to present our views on some other conference, but this was under such

01:50 a pressure and still is, under such a censorship type of approach that last time I saw such

01:57 a censorship was in the communist times, I can tell you.

02:02 The think tank that organized the event legally challenged the decision, claiming freedom

02:06 of speech was under attack. The anti-fascist counter-protest that had sparked police intervention

02:11 took place in the afternoon with less than 100 participants.

02:15 (whooshing)