The Belgian government has offered formal apologies to Italy for last Tuesday's brutal arrest of Mario Borghezio, an Italian member of the European Parliament (MEP). The Belgian Ministery of Foreign Affairs assured the Italian ambassador to Brussels that in future it will do "everything possible to guarantee the immunity of MEPs." How Belgium can give this assurance without punishing those who are responsible for last Tuesday's police violence is not clear. Brussels is the capital of the European Union and houses the EU institutions.
