Survivors of Brussels bombing say state has failed them

Victims of trauma tell court they have had to fight doctors and insurance companies over the past seven years

A court sketch from the trial of the alleged Brussels bombers. AFP

Survivors of the 2016 double suicide bombing in Brussels have said they felt abandoned by the Belgian state, which they described as failing to heal a broken society seven years after the worst terrorist attacks in the country’s history.

Leila Maron, 41, was one of those who spoke at the Justitia Building court in Brussels on Wednesday in the trial of 10 accused in the March 22, 2016 attacks that killed 32 people and injured more than 300.

“Instead of protecting us, the state has left us in the hands of a system plagued by money,” she said.

She was giving evidence at the criminal trial of Mohamed Abrini, Sofiane Ayari, Ali El Haddad Asufi, Osama Krayem, Bilal El Makhoukhi, Herve Bayingana Muhirwa, Salah Abdeslam, and brothers Smail and Ibrahim Farisi. A 10th accused, Osama Atar, is believed to have been killed fighting with ISIS in Syria in 2017.

They are charged with multiple murders and attempted murders in a terrorist context.

Ms Maron had been sitting less than three metres from suicide bomber Khalid El Bakraoui, who killed 16 people when he detonated an explosive device shortly after an underground train had left Maalbeek metro station.

The explosion occurred little more than an hour after El Bakraoui’s accomplices had killed 16 others at Zaventem Airport — a time during which public transport continued to operate in the Belgian capital.

The attacks were claimed by ISIS.

“[The attackers] targeted us as representatives of the state,” said Ms Maron. “A state that has forgotten us and did not bring us the recognition or support that was necessary for us to rebuild.”

Belgium did not set up a state fund for survivors, who instead receive compensation through private insurers, a system Ms Maron described as a “bureaucratic maze” that questions survivors' legitimacy.

She said she was embroiled in a dispute with her insurer, who refuses to recognise her inability to work full-time and in 2019 stopped covering her medical expenses in full.

Doctors provided by the insurance company have pressurised her to return to work full time, she said, despite post-traumatic stress disorders having left her unable to bear noise or to remain in a room that is locked or without windows.

She also suffered from second-degree burns, a perforated eardrum and hearing loss.

“I live despite myself with a brain that is constantly hyper-vigilant, thinking I can die any time,” she said, linking her mental anguish to several miscarriages in the years since the attacks.

“One expert told me that I’d get pregnant if I just stopped mulling it all over,” said Ms Maron, who has given birth to a daughter and is pregnant with her second child.

Patricia Mercier, 54, was in the same metro carriage as Ms Maron and described a similar experience, with insurance companies making her feel guilty for not recovering quickly enough.

“I cannot explain to myself this gap between what I am going through and these medical evaluations,” she said.

Speaking to presiding judge Laurence Massart, Ms Mercier said she was relieved to sit in the court’s quarter reserved for survivors and said insurance companies had treated her like a suspect.

“Here, finally, things seem to be put back in their place,” she said.

Karen Northshield, 37, said such administrative burdens weighed heavily on survivors and in her case, compounded her traumatic injuries.

“I hope that with this trial we’ll be able to move forward ... so that this year all victims will be compensated,” she told The National.

Ms Northshield, a former athlete who was seriously injured at Zaventem Airport as she was waiting at check-in, spent 79 days in intensive care then three and a half years in hospital.

Doctors who removed parts of her gut and spleen believed she would die, she said.

Graphic pictures of her injuries, which showed how her left hip had been shattered by the explosion, were shown during her hearing. “After all these years of misery, I wish to finally have peace,” she told the court.

Others said they had found precious support among their families and friends. Olivier Lecomte, whose wife Sandrine Couturier, 54, was injured in the metro bombing, said it was important to recognise that family members should also be considered as victims although they were not directly hurt in the attack.

Mr Lecomte, 60, said for two years after the attacks, he and their daughters focused all their attention on Ms Couturier.

“For two years, I forgot myself. I repressed my emotions,” he said, adding that no one had asked him how he felt at the time. “I can count on the fingers of one hand how many people asked if I was OK.”

In a rare intervention, one of the accused, Mohamed Abrini, who was alleged by prosecutors to have fled Zaventem without detonating his bomb, asked to speak after Mr Lecomte.

He said he was “sorry” for what Ms Couturier went through. “I believe everyone in the dock feels the same,” he said, referring to the other eight defendants.

“And I want to ask [Mr Lecomte] how he feels,” said Mr Abrini, turning to the couple sitting at a table a few metres away.

“That way he can count on the fingers of two hands how many people asked him how he feels.”

His question prompted the judge to intervene: “It depends on whether the witness wants to answer. How are you?” she asked Mr Lecomte.

Mr Lecomte answered but avoided the usual "I am well" and said instead: “I am, Ms President.”

The trial, which is taking place at a special court set up at the Justitia in the Belgian capital, continues.