“Why was I shot?” 04/10/2007 00:00

4 October 2007

BRUSSELS - Songul Koç, the Turkish woman who survived Hans Van Themsche’s shooting spree, was very emotional during her testimony on Wednesday. “Why was I shot?” she asks.

Koç testified that she has become a different person since 11 May 2006. “I hardly dare to go outside, I lock myself up in my house. I jump at the slightest things and still relive over and over what happened that day,” the woman said.

The woman still doesn’t understand why Van Themsche chose her as a victim. “I was born in Turkey, but grew up in Belgium,” she said. “I speak fluent Dutch and have adjusted to life here.”

“I don’t understand how you can judge people you don’t even know,” she said in reference to the accused. To the question of whether she hated him she said: “No, why should I?”

She  cannot accept the apologies Van Themsche offered on Friday. “If they came from the heart I could have. But that was not the case.”

During the Turkish woman’s testimony Hans Van Themsche seemed to be crying.

Songul Koç says she was sitting on a bench read when Van Themsche shot her. “Suddenly I heard a bang and felt a terrible pain in my chest. I thought there had been an explosion from a gas leak or something.”

 “I never thought that I would be at risk of being shot in Belgium,” she added. “I thought that only happened in other countries.” She was in the intensive care unit for three weeks. “

Michel Vervaeren witnessed Van Themsche open fire on Songul. “He stood there for a moment to make sure he had hit her,” he said. “He smiled and was clearly pleased with what he had done. Then he calmly walked on.”

[Copyright Expatica News 2007]

Subject: Belgian news