“I’m not responsible for the actions of my brother. You don’t choose your family.”
Those are the words of Mourad Laachraoui, a taekwondo athlete from Belgium. Last Friday, the 21-year-old won gold at the European Taekwondo Championships in Switzerland, and will now represent Belgium in the under-59kg category at the Olympic Games in Brazil this summer.
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Mourad is also the estranged younger brother of Najim Laachraoui, one of the suicide bombers who blew themselves up at Brussels airport in an attack that killed 32 people.
Attentats : Najim Laachraoui s'était radicalisé à 17 ans https://t.co/768cP2t3V8 pic.twitter.com/g3zcLKELrA
— Le Parisien (@le_Parisien) May 7, 2016
Najim left for Syria in 2013, and cut off all contact with his family. After the Brussels attacks, Mourad told the press about his memories of his brother. “He was a nice boy, and above all he was clever, that’s what I remember of him.”
He said in another interview in March: “When we were younger we were close, but as I became more passionate about sport we grew apart.”
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Now, with his athletic career on the rise, Mourad is at pains to move past that devastating family connection.
He has said that he wants to “turn the page” on his brother’s actions, a point reiterated by his lawyer, Philippe Culot: “It’s crazy, really — the same parents, the same upbringing — and one turns out really well and the other really bad.”
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In addition to his success last week, Maroud also won his division in the US Open in February and the Luxor Open in Egypt the following month. He also has bronze medals from the Canadian Open and Fujairah Open.
