On Tuesday morning a series of coordinated attacks struck Brussels, with two explosions ripping through the Belgian capital’s main international airport and a third going off in the busy Maelbeek metro station. By 13:30 CET, news agency reports suggested that at least 28 people had died, with at least another 30 wounded.
“We were fearing terrorist attacks, and that has now happened,” Prime Minister Charles Michel said in a press conference. Belgium’s federal prosecutor also confirmed that at least one of the explosions at the airport involved a suicide bomber.
The terrorists have no doubt succeeded in stirring fear and anxiety. And while they may have interrupted the music, and in the most heinous of ways, they cannot stop it. In fact, their actions have inspired a wave of solidarity not just among Belgians, but among the country’s countless allies around the world. Eurovision stars inside and outside of Belgium have joined the chorus and taken to social media to respond. From Anggun to Haidse to Sandra Kim, here are some of their words.
Iveta Mukuchyan (Armenia 2016)
The news is devastating. My thoughts and prayers are with all of you in Brussels. #stoptheviolence
— Iveta Mukuchyan (@IvetaMukuchyan) March 22, 2016
Amir (France 2016)
Europe is under a horrible attack. Makes me think of #Eurovision whose values are the exact opposite #ComeTogether #Brussels #JeSuisBelge
— Amir (@Amir_Off) March 22, 2016
Kate Ryan (Belgium 2006)
No words????????????
— Kate Ryan (@RealKateRyan) March 22, 2016
Laura (Belgium 2016)
— Laura Tesoro (@Lauwraaaaah_) March 22, 2016
Sandra Kim (Belgium 1986)
— SandraKim (@real_sandra_kim) March 22, 2016
Tom Dice (Belgium 2010)
What a time to be alive… #brusselsattack #Brussels pic.twitter.com/Yk9GoRE47Z
— Tom Dice (@TomDiceOfficial) March 22, 2016
Na aanslag #zaventem nu ook #maalbeek #Schuman … Al mijn gedachten bij slachtoffers en familie..
— Tom Dice (@TomDiceOfficial) March 22, 2016
Hadise (Turkey 2009)
Benim ve ailemin defalarca kulland??? havaliman?nda onlarca can gitti.. Allah herkesi korusun ve art?k güne? tüm dünyada do?sun… #Brussels
— HADISE ACIKGOZ (@Hadise) March 22, 2016
Barei (Spain 2016)
¿Cuándo pararan?????#JeSuisBruxelles
— BAREI (@BAREI_MUSIC) March 22, 2016
Anggun (France 2012)
Je suis dans le Thalys qui doit maintenant faire demi tour en direction de Paris. Pensées émues à nos amis en Belgique.. ????????
— Anggun Official (@Anggun_Cipta) March 22, 2016
Natasha St-Pier (France 2001)
Amis belges je pense à vous, restez en sécurité
— Natasha St-Pier (@Natasha_StPier) March 22, 2016
Sakis Rouvas (Greece 2004 and 2009)
All these humans and yet no humanity!#PrayForOurWorld pic.twitter.com/j6ukAKWk7w
— sakisrouvas (@sakisrouvas) March 22, 2016
Rosa Lopez (Spain 2002)
#JeSuisBruxelles #NoAlTerrorismo
El ser humano: él único q se destruyae a sí mismo? es q no me entra ???? #NoMasDolor pic.twitter.com/byylG8L11V— Rosa López (@RosaLopez) March 22, 2016
Soraya (Spain 2009)
Te despiertas con estas noticias y te dan ganas de volver a meterte para que haya sido todo un sueño ????
#Bruselas— Soraya Arnelas (@SorayaArnelas) March 22, 2016
Daan, you can say NO to trade agreement, it’s your choice. knowing that you are nation of traders and we are top #1-5 world’s exporter of organic food and grains, it’s your loss, not ours. and tbh your limits is pathetic. we have 1000 more products that you can buy. what will happen next? all EU countries will sing agreement with Ukraine and will benefit from the deal. and your proud nation will stay aside. loosing some 0.000000001% of the market? we’ll get over it 🙂 topic closed.
@Daan, yes. I call Ukrainian gays who seek asylum in Europe as scum. because they use the loophole in our laws to claim that they have been abused. this loophole has been closed recently by simple addition about discrimination for working people. if someone in Ukraine claims that his life is in danger and he can’t get a job because he’s a gay – he’s a scum. anything else you want to blame me for?
Moment of Silence for people from Belgium We stand on the edge, they want us to break They want us to fall, ’cause power’s at stake They parade, laughing at us as we fade With blood on their hands, enjoying the feast, The cross on the wall, the eyes of the beast They parade, laughing at us as we fade And I just can’t take anymore This hate is burning my soul In the darkest nights feel the power in you Take a moment of silence and fight for the truth Fight for the truth! I’ve seen them all come… Read more »
Oxyk, you call gay people scum? Yet you are on a blog who is managed by homosexuals mostly and have a big gay audience? You really ARE stupid. The only reason my country doesn’t do anything about your corrupt country is because Europe wants your nazi politics in Europe. But guess what, I will vote NO against Ukraine, it would be easily be the most corrupt country and we don’t need your politicians extreme right wing crud. Go fix your own country first instead of trying to gain profit from both Russia and European countries. Keep whining about Russia while… Read more »
Can the moderator of team wiwi please delete this spiteful comments….
The point of the article is not to be petty and fight about politics…..
you can blame my patriotism, Daan, but it’s what your country is seriously lacking – patriotism and balls to revenge your killed citizen in MH17. you’re cowards and all you can do is blame others in your own fails. if you think it’s Ukraine, why don’t you call those who’s guilty to court? that’s why terrorists will do what they want with you, you’re lame cowards who can’t defend own people because you’re afraid of big mighty Russia. even small Ukraine fights back while you’re getting beaten and ask for more. who will respect you after that?
@Daan, nice try. “Ukrainians `refugees` go to NL”? ah really? we don’t have official refugee status for our citizen (because no war declared), unless they are gays or other type of scum (in this case you’re idiots who feed scum, it have nothing to do with Ukraine). European scum, so tolerant to every other refugee, rejects Ukrainians as refugees (except Poland). so nice try.
why don’t you educate yourself on MH17 topic? you sound stupid just like common vulgar Kremlin bot.
https://www.bellingcat.com/tag/mh17/
Oxyk how dare you, Get your stupid patrioism somewhere else. Ukraine shot down the Dutch plane, Ukrainians `refugees` go to NL to get 3000/4000 euro and then leave NL again to go back to Ukraine. And here you are blaming Russia and Syria for ISIS while it was the US who provided those idiots guns in the first place and trained them to overrun the Syrian parlement. Stop twisting the facts. None of these attacks would have happened if the USA knew their place, which is NOT in the middle east, and if they stopped caring so much for their… Read more »
actually, why don’t you see it for yourself?
LDPR leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky TV channel «Russia», commenting on the bloody terrorist attacks in Brussels.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPO2_SnE9tE
@Felix Prochain, of course I do! in my reality people die around me every day. garbage containers explode on the streets of my city and I start my day with the quick glance at the news how much people have been killed in my country overnight and when I hear sound of helicopters at night I pray for wounded people whom they transport to hospitals. why don’t you join me, bastard?
oxyk lives in alternative reality.
The more wars are in the world the more terrorism, the more divide, bitterness, anger, hate. And other wars. Wars are fueled by money of some people in weapons manufacturing but also by businesses that fight for resources and markets. Governments and people in the police, army, judicial, secret services, they feel more and more important so they are easily drawn into the game. And there is a very strong machinery of manipulation. They single out cases, events, causes, to fuel extreme views and attitudes. To create collective enemies. The enemy of warmongerism is the view that people are the… Read more »
@Marie, yes, Russian monkey court after holding for 600+ days kidnapped Iraq veteran, person with diplomat’s immunity, defender of own homeland, first female pilot in Ukraine, Nadiya Savchenko sentenced her for 22 years of Russian prison. that’s all what you should know about Russian law. and for “co-incidence” 2 days earlier the verdict FlyDubai plane crashed in Rostov-on-Don airport (62 people died) and they closed only air gate for Ukrainians to arrive on time. and at the day of the final verdict we had terrible attacks on Brussels. why so many co-incidences? It looks like terroRussia fights back.
@Marie As a person living in South-East Europe I find great offense in the statement you made about terrorist attacks being normal in my country. And as many foreigners living here they would tell you they feel much safer walking on the streets late at night without actually being afraid for their safety. Western Europe is more religiously, ethnically and culturally mixed and this exact thing is the reason of things like this happening. Someone always ends up being misunderstood or wants to prevail above the rest. I pray for Belgium, Turkey, France, Lebanon and all the places where people… Read more »
@oxyk
I feel so sorry for Nadiya Savchenko… Is it true? I cannot believe it is true. The russian judicial system is a joke and a big disgrace.
@oxyk
Russia hates Europe (and the USA), this is not something new. I know that they love to say that Western Europe is “The Rotten Europe”. I don’t even know why people say that Russia is part of Europe, because they are not, they never say that they are european, they consider themselves only as russians.
ISIS have two official languages – Arabic and Russian. it’s Russian creation, from the times of soviet KGB. biggest trading partner of ISIS is not Turkey, it’s Assad and Russia. Too bad you don’t know Russian language to read what Russian politics said about attacks in Belgium. leader of LDPR Zhirinovsky (clown of Putin, who always say what Putin can’t) said that Europe well deserved it and they should and will die. what about MH17? why don’t you bring justice? afraid to pick up on terroRussia? keep hiding and fearing while Russian and their puppet ISIS will turn your life… Read more »
Are you actually fighting over which countries got more compassion? Will that solve any of the problems? Solve the situation in Syria?
What is this, a contest over who can grieve more and why?
people actually died and you bicker over why you didn’t get more attention? What are you, 15?
Get over yourselves and get real
Oh my goodness, jesuischarlie, cryforparis, jesuisbelge. But no one was interested to gain solidarity with syrians during their civil war. Western europe countries should be ashamed of their politics. The funniest fact is most of artists mentioned here are french, spanish and belgian, former colonizators, even worster than brits. Only comment for greece, turkey and armenia was to the point.
People should stop saying why one country wasn’t given any attention compared to another that is all the talks everywhere. This isn’t an oppression olympics. Anywhere you go, there is violence. Violence does not choose any country/ies. Your comparisons will not solve the problem itself.
@AzeriTurk those terrorist came here from your Turkey. Turks made their borders penetrable so that thousands of ‘refugees’ flooded our countries. Besides, Turks are involved in oil trafficking and doing business with Isis. Besides, Turks are at this very moment massacring Kurds in the eastern part of the country and in Iraq. They are threatening to send millions refugees towards Europe.. and in exchange they ask some 9 bil. euros and the membership of EU. What kind of people they are? This is sick. So don’t expect people to feel sorry for them.
I was waiting for this kind of article to be published. Our hearts go to Belgium!
@AzeriTurk. It is wrong but people generally have more negative views on Turkey because of their politics.
Why evryone keep calm when was terror attack in Turkey? #anKara . #isteklal ,
Its is terrible what’s is happening today in Brussels and I really live with our neighbour Belgium who experience such a terrible situation.
Dutch : Het is verschrikkelijk wat er vandaag gebeurt in Brussel en ik leef mee met onze zuiderburen die zo’n verschrikkelijke situatie meegemaakt.
@Benjamin
What do you expect? All the Israel’s neighbors are muslims countries.
Sure … but when there are terror attacks in Israel nobody cares right ?
Lets have a Moment of silence
It’s all about money money money. Dividing people .creating war selling weapons killing people making money money money. .too much politics sad sad sad. .
thanks for the support everyone!
tbh Nigeria would be incredibly lucky if they had a full month without a terrorists attack
We zijn allemaal Belgen! Nous sommes tous belges aujourd’hui!
People have to understand that things like that do not happen all the time in Western Europe. Violence is something ordinary in Eastern Europe and in muslim countries.
If a terrorist attack happens in Iceland, for example, everyone will be shocked. If a terrorist attack happens in Egypt or Nigeria, unfortunately, it will be just a normal day, just like any other day.
Yes, it does sound selfish, but I am just being realistic.
Sorry, guys, but terrorist attacks are completely normal in muslim countries like Turkey, it always happens there, it is not surprising at all. Do not be ridiculous!
when France cried Turkey cried with them. when Turkey cried for many times from same attacks no one shed a tear. when Europe say their loss is greater because they “have no civil war” it’s like saying that their lives is getting more valuable, huh? Ukraine does not have civil war yet it lost 10 000 of lives during last 2 years and counting, no one shed a tear and I”m pretty sure no one will. stop talking about unity.
my condolences to relatives who have lost their loving ones.
and nothing to Europe as a whole.
Widespread war in almost all Middle East and Northern Africa. Until a political solution is not found to stop all that has been made unstable there it is hard to see that what happened today won’t happen again. In fact as Mr Hollande said today worse may come quite soon. Also in Belgium, France and other countries many people were left aside in poverty compared with mainstream society, they make networks of criminality, they have been radicalized. They even were allowed, in sizeable number, to go fight in Syria, Iraq, Yemen. Returning to normal life from this is not for… Read more »
Sweden Government will surely make a lot of controls in the entrances. We are full of bad news, let’s have some peace in Eurovision!
#JeSuisBruxelles #PrayForBrussels #PrayForTheWorld
@ John Fow-tan Dear John, If Erdogan is a bigoted islamic, does it mean you could care less about the innocent civil dead people in Turkey? Is it an excuse? Lifes are valued same everywhere. All of us has the same color red blood. I am from Denmark and atheist. That does not mean i will not feel sad and cry to a islamic/christian/hindu/jew INNOCENT person’s death. @Racal I agree with you i felt terrible to Belgique, Turkey, Lebanon,France… at same level. No more or less. We should react same to the innocent people death. When it comes to death… Read more »
@Jack: Don’t change your plans or your way of life because of these cowards. This is what they want.
I’ll keep flying planes to visit the world, I’ll keep having drinks with my friends, I’ll keep going to concerts because I enjoy music… These assh*les will not change my life. 😉
I really hope there’s a lot of security at Eurovision. Going to Eurovision for the first time would be a dream come true and I’ve poured so much money into this but I just don’t know anymore. I’m already a fearful person as it is but this just makes me tempted to cancel.
The article says “Eurovision stars reacts…” Eurovision stars reacted to Belgium and wiwibloggs simply posted their reactions. It doesn’t mean they don’t care about other attacks or don’t find them horrific!
Brussels and Belgium is in our prayers. #JeSuisBelge
Do we really have to count points between terror attacks? Is it a game? The one who gets the more condolences wins? Is that really what’s on your mind now?
Whether it happens in Belgium, Turkey, France, Lebanon, … It’s an attack on all Europeans, on all humanity. Paying your respects to Belgium doesn’t mean you don’t care about the rest of the world.
Loïc Nottet shared prayers on his Facebook page as well.
Turkey is a bigoted islamic “fake democracy” after Erdogan’s 2nd mandate. Probably that’s why there is no simpathy for them. Don’t mix things. Of course, simple people are victims of these attacks, whatever they are.
@dorian: there’s no twitter back in 1990’s, dear. 🙂
be strong belgium! #prayfortheworld
Let’s not be political here, but there’s some big differences between the attacks in Turkey and Belgium. Totally different political aspects in this even if it’s OF COURSE as tragic in Turkey. Stop being naive people, this is a bigger problem than our opinions here.
Sweden’s Eurovision slogan “Come Together” is exactly right in time this year! We are one!
When Belgium bombing Yugoslavia where are reacatinons of same singers from Belgium and other countries . In 1999 Belgium bombing with other NATO members Yugoslavia and sings song at Eurovision 1999 with many other members of NATO .
Let’s be fair and objective. There were explosions in Turkey but no one said a word about it. Now everyone is calling for solidarity in Belgique? This is hypocritical and wrong. Peace solidarity for EVERYONE and EVERYWHERE. Shame Wiwibloggs.
Muy triste por todo lo que está pasando…Hasta cuando?
There is an obvious reason people react more strongly to Belgium than the other countries you mention below. It’s because Belgium is not having a civil war so it’s more surprising. I’m not saying that terror is less tragic elsewhere, but this is why the media responds the way it does. #PrayForTheWorld
Thinking of Belgium. All my best wishes.