Three Years After Two Swedish Fans Were Shot Dead in Brussels: “We Will Never Forget You”

They were wearing yellow and blue, and that was enough. Three years ago this week, on 16 October 2023, Patrick Lundström and Kent Persson were on their way to watch Sweden play Belgium at the King Baudouin Stadium in Brussels when a gunman opened fire near Place Sainctelette shortly after seven in the evening. Both men died. A third Swede was seriously injured.

The killer was Abdesalem Lassoued, a 45-year-old Tunisian who claimed allegiance to the Islamic State group, which later claimed the attack. The match was abandoned at half-time and more than 35,000 fans were kept inside the stadium for hours while he was on the run. Police found him the next morning in a café in Schaerbeek and shot him; he died of his wounds. Belgian media report that he had been living in the country illegally.

“Två liv släcktes och två familjer förlorade en bror, pappa, make, farfar, morfar, morbror och farbror. Sverige förlorade två landsmän. Patrick och Kent, vi glömmer er aldrig.”

“Two lives were extinguished and two families lost a brother, father, husband, grandfather and uncle. Sweden lost two of its own. Patrick and Kent, we will never forget you.”

— Charlie Weimers, Sweden Democrat MEP, on X

Kristersson: an attack on Sweden

On Friday, the third anniversary, Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson wrote on X that his thoughts are with the families and loved ones. “The attack was aimed at Sweden, our freedom and our open, democratic society,” he wrote, adding that such threats must be met with firmness while protecting an open and free Sweden. He thanked the Belgian government for its solidarity, Belga reports.

Sweden Democrat MEP Charlie Weimers went further. The two men were murdered by an Islamist terrorist because they wore Swedish football shirts, he wrote, and asked how many more must die before the violence against Swedes ends, and when a father can go to a Sweden match and his family can be sure he comes home. Islamism, he wrote, has no place in Europe.

The case is not closed in court. On 8 October Brussels prosecutors demanded three years in prison for three men accused of helping Lassoued obtain illegal weapons, BRUZZ reports. They are charged under weapons law, not with terrorism. Two other suspects are due to face the assize court.