Trumps Bid to Move Hellhole Embassy Sunk by Architectural Icon
Brussels, the European city Donald Trump labeled a ‘Hellhole,’ is picking a fight with the U.S. president in an area close to his heart: real-estate development.
The Belgian capital has taken action to block Washington’s plan to move the U.S. embassy from its current downtown location near Russia’s mission to a bucolic neighborhood adjacent an 11,000-acre forest on the city’s southern outskirts. The point of contention? The new building is too celebrated for what the Americans have planned for it.
The U.S. government -- which still doesn’t have an ambassador to either Belgium or the Brussels-based European Union -- purchased the site in 2016, with the intention of tearing down the existing building because it doesn’t meet its size requirements or modern environmental standards.
But last year, the regional city government applied to have the building placed on a “safeguard list”, which would prevent any modification or destruction to the four-winged, copper- and glass-covered structure.
The building, which formerly housed the ‘Royale Belge’ insurance company and more recently a local AXA SA outpost, “is part of the flagship heritage of our region,” said Lidia Gervasi, spokeswoman to the regional minister responsible for monuments and sites. “For many people living in Brussels, it’s an icon of modern architecture of the 1960s.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-01/trump-bid-to-move-hellhole-embassy-sunk-by-architectural-icon
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