Belgian guards protect key sites across country

Jan. 17, 2015: Belgian para-commandos patrol near a synagogue in the center of Antwerp, Belgium. (AP)

BRUSSELS – Spldiers fanned out to guard possible terror targets across Belgium Saturday, including some buildings within the Jewish quarter of the port city of Antwerp. It was the first time in 30 years that authorities used troops to reinforce police in Belgium's cities, and came a day after anti-terror raids netted dozens of suspects across Western Europe.

In an interview broadcast Saturday on Belgium's VRT network, Belgian Defense Minister Steven Vandeput said soldiers could be deployed to protect certain embassies and some buildings within Antwerp's Jewish quarter. Belgium has increased its terror warning to 3, the second-highest, following the anti-terror raids of Thursday which left two suspects dead.

In France, an official disclosed that Said Kouachi, one of the gunman who attacked the offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, had been quietly buried.

After an initial refusal, the mayor of Reims was forced to backtrack and allow the burial.

Mayor Arnaud Robinet said the government had insisted he allow the elder Kouachi brother to be buried in Reims because according to French law residents of a town have the right to be buried there.

"He was buried last night, in the most discrete, anonymous way possible," Robinet said in an interview on French television channel BFM TV. Robinet said he didn't know where Kouachi was buried in the cemetery, which he didn't identify.

Kouachi and his brother Cherif were killed by French counter-terrorism police Jan. 9 after they killed 12 people at the offices of Charlie Hebdo. Cherif Kouachi is to be buried in Gennevilliers, a suburb of Paris where he lived, the city said in a statement Friday.

A third terrorist, Amedy Coulibaly, killed five people including four hostages at a kosher market in Paris before he was killed by police. There has been no word of plans for his burial.