Belgium fracturing along linguistic lines

In the meantime, outsiders seem to find amusement in the predicament of the little country famous for chocolate, French fries and producing 500 kinds of beers. An Australian journalist insisted the country had to stay together because who'd want "Flemish chocolates," or to be anything "Walloon," the "Oompa-loompa of national adjectives"? This fall, "Belgium, a kingdom in three parts," was listed for sale on EBay but was quickly pulled after a bid came in at $13 million.

If Belgium has any image internationally, it is as the home of the 27-member European Union, founded 50 years ago to transcend just this kind of Balkanization that plunged Europe into two world wars in the last century. So no one has missed the irony that over the half a century the EU came together, the country that plays host to its capital has spiraled further apart.

Polls show that fewer than half the Flemings are ready to saw apart the country, but a majority in both regions envisions that sometime in the next decade the kingdom known as Belgium will no longer exist.

As crises of these sorts go, this one has been relatively civil. No one has pulled a gun or exploded a bomb or threatened to behead the king, who went off on holiday this summer as the crisis ground on. Rather, grievances are aired on television, in competing editorials and in debates on the floor of Belgium's six governing parliaments. And there are such skirmishes almost daily.

At the core of the controversy is the struggle to answer: What is a Belgian?

"I am a Fleming and a European citizen and I have always felt like that," said Geert Bourgeois, a minister in the Flanders government who founded the New-Flemish Alliance, a small but influential secessionist party.

Press Bourgeois about his national identity, and he goes right past the idea of Belgium to describe the growing frustration of growth-minded Flanders in attempting to deal with healthcare, justice, even traffic congestion. The Flemings want to invest in prisons; the Walloons don't. According to many, Flemings want tougher standards for unemployment benefits; Walloons, who rely heavily on government subsidies, don't.

"Today, in the Flemish-Walloon marriage," Bourgeois insisted, "it is like a husband that says to his spouse: 'Honey, I love you and I want us to stay together forever, but forget about your wishes and needs.' "