Belgian news in pictures: November 2008

King’s feast in Brussels.

Brussels : (L-R, first row) Belgium’s Prince Lorenz, Princess Astrid, Queen Fabiola, King Albert II, Prince Philippe, Princess Mathilde and Princess Claire,
(L-R, second row) Senate chairman Armand De Decker, Prime Minister Yves Leterme, Chamber chairman Herman Van Rompuy, Senator Hugo Vandenberghe and Chamber vice-chairman Herman De Croo (L-R, third row) Vice-Prime Minister and Interior Minister Patrick Dewael, Vice-Prime Minister and Minister of Employment and of Equal Opportunities Joelle Milquet, Defence Minister Pieter De Crem, Vice-Prime Minister and Minister of Finance and of Institutional Reforms Didier Reynders and Vice-Prime Minister and Minister of Social Affairs and Public Health Laurette Onkelinx are pictured at the federal parliament, on the occasion of the King’s feast, in Brussels, on November 15, 2008. 

Belgian Prime Minister Yves Leterme (L) and European Commission chairman Jose Manuel Barroso (R) arrive for a press conference on November 20, 2008 in Brussels after a meeting on the financial crisis. Governments scrambled to cushion the impact of the finance crisis with France launching a 20-billion-euro sovereign wealth fund and China unveiling a jobs protection plan as the car industry made huge new cuts.

Spain’s European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso (L) sits next to France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy (C) and French High Commissioner for Active Solidarities against Poverty, Martin Hirsch (R) on November 24, 2008 in Paris during a forum with leading European figures on the topic ‘Strengthening the Contribution of Finance to Sustainable Development: Long Term Challenges, Proposals for Europe’. The forum aims to develop new proposals for action to put the actors of the financial industry at the service of development, social progress and the environment.

Belgium’s Defence Minister Pieter De Crem, Vice-Prime Minister and Minister of Social Affairs and Public Health Laurette Onkelinx, Prime Minister Yves Leterme and Vice-Prime Minister and Minister of Finance and of Institutional Reforms Didier Reynders are pictured as they honour the armistice of World War I (1914-1918) at the monument of the unknown soldier in Brussels, on November 11, 2008. World War I, also know as the Great War, ended 90 years ago

(Expatica 2008)

Photos: AFP

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