Belgium’s Drug War Escalates: 41 Extradition Requests to UAE Expose Global Narco Networks

According to the Belgian Minister of Justice, 41 extradition requests have been addressed to the United Arab Emirates by Belgium: five initial extradition requests filed in 2022, fourteen new requests (including one case closed due to the death of the person) submitted in 2023, ten requests in 2024, 12 this year and two others are in the process of being prepared. Currently, 23 requests are in the initial phase of the judicial procedure, namely an initial administrative check carried out by the local Ministry of Justice, the same source specifies, adding that six requests have already progressed further in the judicial procedure and are pending before the Court of Appeal, which rules as the extradition jurisdiction.

However, these decisions are systematically challenged before the Supreme Court (appeal on points of law). Indeed, judicial cooperation with the United Arab Emirates has proven to be complicated. An extradition treaty had been signed between the two countries in December 2021, but it was not until November 2022 that it had been ratified by the United Arab Emirates. After that, the extraditions began to be carried out. The first person extradited was Franc Gergely, a 33-year-old Albanian known to be one of the biggest cocaine traffickers. In March 2023, it was the Belgian-Moroccan drug trafficker Nordin El Hajjioui, nicknamed "Dikke Nordin". Recently, three extraditions have been officially approved at the highest level in the United Arab Emirates.

Among the extradited individuals, Othman El Ballouti, a Moroccan-origin drug trafficker arrested in early December 2024 in Dubai. "So far, six extraditions have actually been carried out: one at the end of December 2023 and two in 2024, including the drug trafficker Nordin El Hajjioui. On July 13, three new extraditions - including the drug trafficker Othman El Ballouti - took place, which doubled the total number in a single operation," says La Dernière Heure.