AhlulBayt News Agency - Muslims in Brussels marched in the city streets to condemn the recent terrorist attacks.
According to the AFP, Muslims who had gathered for Friday prayers at Brussels' Grand Mosque streamed outside to chant 'Long Live Belgium,' feeling the pressure to tackle radicalization after the attacks on the city.
'The time has come to act,' Imam Ndiaye Mouhameth Galaye told AFP ahead of his sermon. 'Today we're launching a programme against radicalisation.'
'These criminals committed barbaric crimes,' the imam said. 'We are going to tell them that what they did has nothing to do with Islam.'
Condemning the attacks in which 31 people died and 300 were injured, the Senegalese-born imam said Muslims were 'sad and sorrowful' and urged the crowd 'to give their blood' to those wounded.
Once the prayer session was over, the faithful gathered outside the building in one of the city's parks.
"We've repeatedly condemned what happened in Paris and elsewhere. The time has come for action. Belgium's been hit," the imam said.The CICB aims to launch a programme targeting youth that would involve theologians practising a moderate Islam, he added.
Though the details have yet to be finalised, Galaye said the project is almost up and running. He said he had often provided counselling for families worried about their children becoming radicalised.
"We try to contact them and have already stopped several young people from leaving for Syria. Some are currently studying here now," he said.
Outside the mosque, one young man said, "Muslims aren't terrorists", while another added, "We're very sad about all this, it has to stop."
"(The terrorists) are all drug dealers and gunmen," said 25-year-old Sohaib Ben Ayad. "We don't have to justify ourselves as Muslims, we too know people who were hurt at the airport or on the metro."
Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif in a telephone conversation with his Belgian counterpart Didier Reynders condemned Tuesday terrorist attacks in Brussels.
Zarif referred to terrorism and extremism as problems facing international community stressing that fighting against extremism requires a global action.
Three terrorist bombings killed at least 30 people and injured about 230 in the Belgian capital when explosions occurred at Brussels’ airport and subway station Tuesday morning.
The terrorist group of Daesh (also known as ISIS) claimed responsibility for the tragic attacks.
President Hassan Rouhani too expressed his condolences on the fatal attacks to the government and people of Belgium in a tweet posted earlier in Tuesday.
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