Prohibited weapons

Under the Belgian arms law of 8th June 2006, the following weapons are forbidden in Belgium. If you are found in possession of any of these weapons at the airport, you will immediately be taken into custody for questioning by the airport inspection and/or the federal police, after which the relevant legal charges will be issued against you. 

The list of forbidden weapons includes:

1° Anti-personnel mines, booby traps and similar mechanisms, and blinding laser weapons;

2° incendiary weapons;

3° Weapons that were designed for military use only, including but not limited to: automatic firearms, launching gear, artillery, rockets, weapons that use other forms of radiation than those included in 1° and munition that was specifically designed for said weapons, chargers suitable for those weapons only, bombs, torpedoes and grenades;

4° submunition;

5° Sliding or folding switchblades with lock, butterfly knives, brass knuckles and bladed weaponry that's disguised to like other objects;
Warning: the popular folding knives that look like credit cards also fall under this category!

6° Cane-swords and cane guns other than decorative replicas of historical arms;

7° Clubs and batons;

8° Firearms of which the barrel or the stock can be taken apart, firearms that were made or changed in such a way that they can be concealed on the body or deviate from the technical specifications of the model that's described on the permit as well as firearms that have another appearance than that of a weapon;

9° Wearable devices that can be used to deliver an electric shock that will render people defenceless or cause them pain, with the exception of medical or veterinary appliances;

10° Objects that were made to hit people with poisonous, suffocating, tear-inducing and other similar substances, with the exception of medical substances;

11° Foldable firearms above calibre 20;

12° Throwing knives;

13° Nunchucks;

14° Throwing stars;

15° Firearms that are equipped with the following parts and accessories, including such parts and accessories on their own:

• Silencers;
• Clip magazines the capacity of which exceeds the standard capacity determined by the Ministry of Justice for each model of firearms and, where appropriate, for certain categories of owners;
• Aiming devices for firearms that project a beam onto the target and night-vision devices
• Mechanisms with which a firearm can be transformed into an automatic firearm;

16° Certain devices, arms and munition defined by the Ministry of Justice and Foreign Affairs that could pose a (new) serious threat to public safety, and weapons and munition that for this reason may only be available to the services defined in article 27, § 1, second and third paragraph.

17° Objects and substances that weren't designed to be used as weapons, which have been transformed, modified or mixed to be used as a weapon and which, given the concrete circumstances, are likely to be used by the person carrying or transporting them to inflict bodily harm or threaten others.

18° Inert munitions and armoured objects that may contain depleted uranium or any other kind of industrial uranium.

19° Automatic firearms that have been converted to semi-automatic firearms;

20° Long semi-automatic firearms which can be shortened to a length of less than 60 cm without losing their functionality by means of a folding or telescopic butt or a butt which can be removed without the use of tools

Based on the Aviation Act, ammunition was added to this list as well.

Transport of firearms

The transport of firearms, ammunition and chargers is only permitted if the conditions set out in Art. 21 of the Law regulating economic and individual activities with weapons (8 June 2006) are met.