Move close to home

Date: 02/11/1995

Schengen ministers are staging a meeting in Ostend, despite the fact that all other meetings under the Belgian Schengen presidency have been in Brussels. The reason has nothing to do with waving across the Channel at the anti-Schengen UK, or keeping the media spotlight off a gathering which could turn into a confrontation with France over border controls. It's simpler than that: Belgian Interior Minister Johan Vande Lanotte comes from Ostend and might by now have been mayor if he had not been attracted by the offer of his current post. He clearly wants to keep his connections up for an eventual return to base.