Convicted jihadist recruiter stripped of Belgian citizenship

A man found guilty in Belgium of recruiting jihadists was stripped Tuesday of his Belgian citizenship, a rare move which the country's Flemish nationalists want applied more broadly in terrorism cases.

Fouad Belkacem, a 36-year-old born in Belgium to Moroccan parents, was sentenced in 2015 to 12 years in prison for heading "a terrorist group," Sharia4Belgium, which sent jihadists to Syria.

An appeals court in Antwerp withdrew his citizenship on grounds "he seriously failed to meet his obligations as a Belgian citizen and posed a permanent threat to public security," Belgian media reported. Belkacem's lawyer Liliane Verjauw denounced the decision by the court in the northern Dutch-speaking city, saying she would take further action to restore his nationality.

"Usually the second step is to try to expel him to Morocco," Verjauw told AFP. "Yet his whole family is in Belgium, his wife and his four children are Belgian. He does not have a Moroccan passport."