In 1996 it's a tricky situation for the security services. The Dutroux scandal has just come to light. The whole of Belgium is in uproar. 300,000 people have just marched through the streets of Brussels. The Liege firefighters are washing down the Palace of Justice, their 20th century version of the Augean Stables. Revolution is in the air.

I return briefly to the Propagande Due (P2) in Italy. When its existence was discovered, the Italian society was shaken to the core. Politicians, journalists, the heads of all three Italian intelligence services... all members of the P2!

A senior policemen working on the Dutroux investigation recently told me the following astonishing story.

Belgian policeman Patrick Van Brussel had discovered the truth about the people controlling the Haemers criminal gang, and he paid a terrible price for it.

Belgian policeman Patrick van Brussel was a hero. Or so he thought, after successfully tracking down one of Belgium’s most notorious gangsters in Brazil. 'Do whatever he takes to capture Patrick Haemers,' his superiors had thundered at him.

My name is John Stevens and I’ve been invited to blog here. For instance about about the Brabant Killers (in Dutch, the “Bende Van Nijvel”, in French “Les Tueurs du Brabant”) that rampaged through Belgium in the mid 1980’s).