Government brutalizes, the street protests in Belgium (opens in new tab)

Belgium has once again been paralysed by strikes. Tens of thousands of workers demonstrated in Brussels on Tuesday 12 May 2026, the day before the opening of the debates on the law and pension reform programme. Since the formation of the government, structured around the two major right-wing parties (the Flemish nationalists of the NVA and the “Trumpified” Francophone neoliberals of the MR- Mouvement réformateur), the trade union common front (Fédération générale du travail de Belgique-FGTB, ...