Surprise arrest in unprecedented EU sabotage case

More to come?

Three men and a woman were arrested following nearly two years of intense investigation by Europol with the assistance of the French intelligence services. The fact that Europol does anything comes as a surprise to many, but even more startling are the charges brought against the four unnamed defendants: sabotage!

An anonymous source told the BJ reporters that the investigation started shortly after the collapse of part of ceiling of the hemicycle in the European Parliament’s Louise Weiss building in Strasbourg in August 2008. This investigation was abandoned a couple of months ago, until the collapse of part of the ceiling in the Jacques Delors building in Brussels – shared by the European Union’s Committee of the Regions and the Economic and Social Committee – this 10 August.

Coincidence seemed unlikely and an anonymous tip led the investigators to a small apartment in the Brussels suburbs, where the alleged saboteurs were arrested, as well as boxes of pamphlets accusing the EU of maintaining too many useless buildings for the sake of not always useful institutions. The group seems to call itself the CCCC (Cut the Crap Collapse the Ceilings) or 4Cs, and material found on one of the computers in the apartment indicates their hard feelings against the dual location of the European Parliament and the doubtful usefulness of the CoR and ESC bodies. We were also told that the french intelligence services were specifically keen on making the arrest, as President Sarkozy considered the sabotage operations to be directed specifically against France. As an unofficial source close to the French President told us: “First, they let the ceiling fall off in France, and then in a building carrying the name of a former French Commission President…and we all know that the only thing the ancient Gauls were scared off, was the sky falling on their head. This is a symbolic attack on France, no doubt about it”.

It is unclear if the four make up the enire organisation or if other arrests will follow.