Authorities in Brussels have cancelled this year’s new year celebration plans over fears of a terrorist attack, on the same day that Turkey said it had foiled a holiday attack plot.

In Ankara, officials said police had detained two suspected Islamic State militants accused of planning suicide bombings during new year celebrations in the capital city’s heart.

“They were caught before they had the opportunity to take action,” said the office of the chief prosecutor of Ankara, Turkey’s capital.

The men were detained in a raid on a house in the Mamak neighbourhood, where police seized a suicide vest armed with a bomb, a second explosive device that was fortified with ball bearings and metal sticks and concealed inside a backpack, as well as bomb-making equipment, according to the prosecutor’s office.

The two men, Turkish nationals identified only by their initials MC and AY, were being questioned by anti-terrorism police. The prosecutor’s office said the men had staked out possible locations in Ankara where they could carry out the attacks.



The state-run Anadolu agency, quoting unnamed police and judiciary officials, said the would-be bombers had intended to blow themselves during holiday festivities at bars and a shopping mall in the central Kizilay district.

“They are suspected of being affiliated with the Islamic State and were planning an attack,” a Turkish official told Agence France-Presse.

In Belgium, meanwhile, an investigation was continuing into what authorities characterised as a “serious threat” of holiday season attacks directed at police, soldiers and popular attractions in the capital Brussels.

The arrest of two suspects was announced on Tuesday by the Federal Prosecutor’s Office, along with the seizure of military-style training uniforms, computer equipment and propaganda materials from the Isis. No weapons or explosives were found.

Brussels officials, however, were sufficiently worried about the remaining risks that Mayor Yvane Mayeur announced on Wednesday evening that the planned New Year’s Eve fireworks display and related festivities in the city centre were being cancelled.

On Thursday, the arrested men, whose names have not been made public, are due to go before a magistrate, who will decide whether to hold them for another month.

Belgium has been one of Europe’s leading recruiting grounds for foreign jihadi fighters, and was home to four of the attackers who killed 130 people in Paris in November, including suspected ringleader Abdelhamid Abaaoud and fugitive Salah Abdeslam. Nine other people have been arrested in Belgium in investigations linked to the Paris attacks, which were claimed by Isis.

In France, authorities were also clearly preparing for a possible worst-case scenario over the new year. About 60,000 police and troops are to be deployed throughout the country on Thursday.

“The same troops who used to be in Mali, Chad, French Guyana or the Central African Republic are now ensuring the protection of French people,” said defence minister Jean-Yves Le Drian.



A previously scheduled New Year’s Eve fireworks show in Paris has been cancelled. Instead, there will be a five-minute video display at the Arc de Triomphe that, in Mayor Anne Hidalgo’s words, is aimed at “sending the world the message that Paris is standing, proud of its lifestyle and living together”.