Antwerp

Antwerp is a city in Belgium and the capital of the Antwerp Province and the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504. it is the most populous city proper in Belgium, and with a metropolitan population of around 1,200,000 people, it is the second-largest metropolitan region after Brussels. The Port of Antwerp is one of the biggest in the world, ranking second in Europe and within the top 20 globally. The city also has been the largest diamond centre in the world since 1447, which earned it the title of Diamond City.

Quotes

 * I thought about it carefully and I remained convinced that there is no place in Belgium that it could be more desirable for me to represent than Antwerp. ... I have always been imbued with the conviction that matters which particularly affect the prosperity of Antwerp should have a large part in the care of the government. Belgium had its era of commercial activity, because at that time it had ready-made means of selling the products of its manufactures. I think that the efforts of the government must tend to restore life to maritime trade, to multiply the means of exchange with overseas countries, to replace the colonial outlets which we have lost, to facilitate commercial relations with a liberal legislation.
 * All the King's Men' A search for the colonial ideas of some advisers and "accomplices" of Leopold II (1853-1892). (Hannes Vanhauwaert), 4. Viceroys without colonial aspirations? Jules Van Praet (1806-1887) DISCAILLES, E. Charles Rogier (1800-1885) from unpublished documents, III, 1894, 9.


 * I don't want a Muslim as mayor of Antwerp. But I'm afraid that will happen sooner or later.
 * Filip Dewinter: ‘I don't want a Muslim as mayor.’.


 * While in 1960 barely 7% of the Antwerp population had an immigration background, in 2021 this has evolved to 59.7% of which the vast majority has a non-European background: 39.6% of Antwerp residents are of non-European descent. Knowing that in 2020 49.4% of the mothers of newborns were of non-European nationality, the bill was quickly settled. In a maximum of 20 years Antwerp will have a majority of residents of non-European descent, the majority of whom will be Muslims. The population is moving at a rapid pace. The flexible Belgian nationality legislation has become a kind of “Fast Belgian factory”. Foreigners disappear from the statistics and officially become Belgians, but of course ensure the further multiculturalization of Antwerp. Along with the ethnic transition, a cultural shift is also taking place, with all its consequences. The native Flemings and their culture and way of life threaten to become a minority in the long run, ripe for the reserve…
 * Filip Dewinter: “Depopulation is happening in record time in Antwerp”


 * We are exhausted in Antwerp and have endured so much that this war seems without purpose.. ..[and that it seemed] strange that Spain, which provides so little for the needs of this country... has an abundance of means to wage an offensive war elsewhere.
 * Peter Paul Rubens In a letter to Pierre Dupuy, Sept. / Oct. 1627; as quoted by Simon Schrama, in Rembrandt's eyes, Alfred A. Knopf - Borzoi Books, New York 1999, p. 248


 * Thanks to the care of the Belgian military authorities, the volunteers returned to their homeland, we were able to find asylum in the barracks in Antwerp.
 * The Mexican adventure of Maximilian and Charlotte through Belgian eyes. The Mexican Empire in the Newspaper Press (1864-1867). (Wim Bouw), The last stretch for the volunteers The ship arrived in Antwerp on 9 March. The volunteers were taken to the barracks in the city. Their festive reception was described in detail, but there was very little opinion. Le Journal de Bruxelles, one of the newspapers that had accused the government of its involvement, now praised the same government for making the barracks available. Le Journal de Bruxelles, 12 maart 1867.