Belgium says investigating 'significant' meat fraud

Belgium on Monday said at least three nations had received falsely labelled meat products from an abattoir in the south of the country in what it called a "significant" food fraud operation.

Dutch probe cross-border nuclear safety

The Dutch safety board announced on Wednesday it is launching an investigation into how the Netherlands works with its neighbours to prevent and handle any cross-border nuclear power accidents.

Belgium extends lives of ageing nuclear reactors

Belgium agreed to extend the life of two ageing nuclear reactors for another decade under a hard-won deal to preserve jobs and invest in the transition to cleaner energy.

Belgium plans collection of plane, train, ferry users' data

Belgium on Monday unveiled plans for a controversial system to collect data on all airline passengers, as well as international train and ferry travellers, in the wake of a foiled attack on a train running between Belgium ...

ARIEL mission to reveal 'Brave New Worlds' among exoplanets

An ambitious European mission is being planned to answer fundamental questions about how planetary systems form and evolve. ARIEL will investigate the atmospheres of several hundred planets orbiting distant stars. It is one ...

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Belgium

Belgium (i/ˈbɛldʒəm/ bel-jəm), officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO. Belgium covers an area of 30,528 square kilometres (11,787 sq mi), and it has a population of about 11 million people. Straddling the cultural boundary between Germanic and Latin Europe, Belgium is home to two main linguistic groups, the Dutch-speakers, mostly Flemish, and the French-speakers, mostly Walloons, plus a small group of German-speakers. Belgium's two largest regions are the Dutch-speaking region of Flanders in the north and the French-speaking southern region of Wallonia. The Brussels-Capital Region, officially bilingual, is a mostly French-speaking enclave within the Flemish Region. A German-speaking Community exists in eastern Wallonia. Belgium's linguistic diversity and related political conflicts are reflected in the political history and a complex system of government.

Historically, the present day states of Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg together with the North of France (Artois, French Flanders), and a small part of Western Germany, were known as the Low Countries. These regions were unitied in a personal union of states starting the 14th and during the 15th and 16th century. The Low Countries were called Belgica in Latin after the Roman province Gallia Belgica which covered the core of the same area. From the end of the Middle Ages until the 17th century, it was a prosperous centre of commerce and culture. From the 16th century until the Belgian Revolution in 1830, when Belgium seceded from the Netherlands, many battles between European powers were fought in the area of Belgium, causing it to be dubbed the battleground of Europe, a reputation strengthened by both World Wars.

Upon its independence, Belgium participated in the Industrial Revolution and, during the course of the 20th century, possessed a number of colonies in Africa. The second half of the 20th century was marked by the rise of non-violent conflicts between the Flemish and the Francophones fuelled by cultural differences on the one hand and an asymmetrical economic evolution of Flanders and Wallonia on the other hand. These still-active conflicts have caused far-reaching reforms of the formerly unitary Belgian state into a federal state which may lead to a complete partition of the country in the future.

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