EU Committing serious crimes can now lead to loss of Belgian nationality - Redditors actually mad over this lmao

The federal government has approved a bill that will allow the state to revoke Belgian citizenship from people found guilty of serious crimes such as homicide and sexual assault.

Anyone who has acquired Belgian nationality in the last 15 years and is found guilty of a serious crime – including homicide, sexual assault and organized crime – can be stripped of their nationality. The wide expansion of an existing law that largely applied only to terrorism has been approved by the federal Chamber of Representatives following a proposal by federal justice minister Annelies Verlinden.

Previously this legislation was only applied to terrorism, but now it has been expanded to include other serious crimes. The criminal must have received a prison sentence of at least five years to be considered for the measure. Revoking citizenship is not automatically applied to every criminal; it will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

The same cannot be said for terrorists who have double nationality: Under the new legislation, their Belgian citizenship will now be automatically revoked, whereas earlier that was also handled on a case-by-case basis.

The new legislation is “a powerful message,” says Verlinden, that “anyone guilty of grave crimes that undermine the foundations of our society, can lose his or her Belgian citizenship.”

Tougher on vehicular manslaughter​

The Chamber also approved a bill submitted by Verlinden last year that would toughen sentences for traffic accidents leading to deaths. The term verkeersdoodslag, or vehicular manslaughter, will now be used, whereas earlier this was simply “causing a deadly traffic accident”.

The tougher sentences – a maximum of 10 years in prison, up from five, and fines up to €16,000 rather than €10,000 – could be applied to repeat offenders or anyone driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol.

https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2026/0...rimes-can-now-lead-to-loss-of-belgian-nation/ (Archive)

Enjoy retarded reddit takes:

https://old.reddit.com/r/worldnews/...s_can_now_lead_to_loss_of/?sort=controversial (Archive)

 

[Looseleaf Paper]

Neat

Anyone who has acquired Belgian nationality in the last 15 years

Gay, stopped reading.

 

[Kafir]

Copy paste that policy here in the states let’s go.

 

[Nero Fiddled]

This must be the only based law Belgium has ever come up with.

 

[JohnnyG]

I thought for sure the "serious crimes" would be things like doing a burnout on a rainbow crosswalk, or "misgendering" a dude in a dress.

But maybe Third World fatigue is setting in.

 

[Divine right to rule]

Unfathomably based. Needs to catch on and become a base for stripping citizenship of any non-natives.

The EU will fight this tooth and nail, btw.

 

[ephermeral]

Would this only count for people with dual citizenship, because otherwise they would be stateless? Don’t a lot of these people throw away their original documents when they sneak into the country? Sounds like a great idea, I hope for their sake it won’t be some toothless decree.

 

[Not A Cat Person]

It's too little, too late for Belgium.

 

[REGENDarySumanai]

I would have made it cover it for all time and then apply it to every country in the world. If you manage to do it in all countries, you are officially stateless.

 

[babyDunk]

Why push such a racist policy? What has this world come to??

 

[Kosher Dill]

This is better than nothing, but the real problem is how many people never should have had citizenship in the first place. It's not enough to just say "oops" when one of them drives a truck of peace commits a verkeersdoodslag. People are already dead at that point.
Good start, I guess, but only a start.

 

[vanta pilled]

This is great on paper (although it would better if it was the past 100 years), in the age of two-tier justice it might just be a way to punish natives. All the people this should be aimed at will either be not applicable or get their crimes downgraded to below the threshold because of muh systemic racism.

 

[Super-Chevy454]

This must be the only based law Belgium has ever come up with.

Sad then UK don't follow suit.

 

[robobobo]

Uh huh. If they put a five year prison requirement on deporting, you'll just see judges refusing to sentence the local murderrapist for more than 4 years, 364 days. It's already happened in Canada.

 

[PlapPlapPlapPlapPlap]

Enjoy retarded reddit takes

Sure what the hell. Top comment:

I FUCKING LOVE HOW PEOPLE IGNORE THIS SIMPLE FUCKING FACT: You know who will have Zero issue with this?
PEOPLE WHO DONT COMMIT SERIOUS CRIMES! And you don’t have to „butwhatabout?!“ Its very simple: don’t commit these crimes and youre good.
How is „Not being a serious criminal“ such a hard ask for so many?
Nobody talks about stealing bread for your kids!

Seems reasonable. But then comes the reply:

I'm not calling you MAGA, but a warning these are all MAGA talking points. Fascism doesn't announce itself--it sneaks in quietly and sounds quite rational in the beginning.
For anyone that thinks "this could never happen here!" I'd suggest checking out They Thought They Were Free by Milton Mayer.

 

[Mister Fister]

Why push such a racist policy? What has this world come to??

Agreed, it's not enough. We need to remove nationality from the Africans and Arabs here.

 

[babyDunk]

Agreed, it's not enough. We need to remove nationality from the Africans and Arabs here.

They built europe you chud!

 

[Bioniclelover]

Interesting, tbh I can't think of a similar law being a thing anywhere. While not too drastic, I don't really see any downside to this law, so it could be very useful if implemented outside of Belgium which is probably already too far gone. Given that it is to be considered on case by case basis the process might be too slow to do much in practice, although it's better than nothing.

 

[kawaiikat420]

The criminal must have received a prison sentence of at least five years to be considered for the measure.

This ruins it. What will end up happening is that bleeding heart judges will purposefully hand out lesser sentences to convicted criminals so that they can avoid having their citizenship revoked. It will enable criminality and permissiveness.

 

[Rootless Cosmopolitan]

This ruins it. What will end up happening is that bleeding heart judges will purposefully hand out lesser sentences to convicted criminals so that they can avoid having their citizenship revoked. It will enable criminality and permissiveness.

Yeah I agree. We need to implement it here but couple it with sentencing judges to death who let dangerous criminals out who reoffend during the sentencing period.

Eg if you let out someone after 2 years who should have served 5 years for vehicular manslaughter, you should be forced to commit seppuku if they commit another crime in the remaining 3 years.