Police are trying to shut down the National Conservatism Conference in Brussels after orders from local authorities.
Emir Kir, the Mayor of the Saint-Josse-ten-Noode district in Brussels, ordered the shut down of the conference today to “guarantee public safety” and added that “In Etterbeek, Brussels City and Saint-Josse, the far-right is not welcome.”
“The left-wing totalitarians that run the EU know that National Conservatives and their message pose the greatest threat to their misrule,” Yoram Hazony, an organizer of the conference, told National Review. “That’s why they’ve abandoned every paean to liberal values and pulled out all the stops to shut us down. National Conservatism — both the movement and this conference — will continue undeterred.”
Police entered the venue when British politician Nigel Farage was onstage, according to video footage released on social media by a Guardian reporter. The conference schedule featured additional speakers like American commentator Rod Dreher, Prime Minister of Hungary Viktor Orbán, and British politician Suella Braverman.
“What’s happening is that Brussels police have been ordered to close down the event. . . because we are creating a public disturbance,” Hazony told attendees only a few hours after the conference had started. “However, they only sent three police officers, and so when the police walked in and all the cameras turned on them, they got scared and they went back outside.”
Hazony added that the event would be “closed down gradually” and encouraged attendees to remain within the venue, noting that the police would not allow someone to re-enter.
“I guess they couldn’t take free speech any longer,” Prime Minister Orbán said on social media. “The last time they wanted to silence me with the police was when the Communists set them on me in ‘88. We didn’t give up then and we will not give up this time either!”
Saurabh Sharma, who was scheduled to chair a panel discussion, said that “Brussels Police are holding NatCon Brussels 2 hostage” and shared a photo showing five police officers outside the venue preventing people from entering. Sharma is the executive director of the Edmund Burke Foundation, which is a sponsor of the National Conservatism Conference.
Paul Coleman, executive director Alliance Defending Freedom International, was scheduled to speak at the conference tomorrow and the police prevented him from venturing the venue.
“No one is giving any explanation as to what the legal basis for the police action here is,” Coleman said in a video, noting that two other venues had previously cancelled hosting the conference. “This is the definition of cancel culture. This is the state of free speech in Europe.”
Conference attendee and British academic Matt Goodwin released a video on social media showing the scene from inside the venue and referred to it as a “bunker.”
“In Brussels, in the heart of the European Union, in a western liberal democracy, we’re unable to have a conversation about identity, migration, borders, family, and security without facing attempts to have it shut down,” Goodwin told National Review, adding that is “ironic” that “the people who claim to be the most liberal, enlightened, and tolerant of all are actually trying to shut us down and prevent us from having a discussion about these issues.”
An image on social media shows 16 police officers standing outside the venue.