Belgium’s ‘MolenGeek’ transforms terror-tarnished Molenbeek

Molengeek co-founders Ibrahim Ouassari (R), a Belgian from the Brussels commune of Molenbeek, and Julie Foulon from France pose for a photo at the MolenGeek centre in the Brussels commune of Molenbeek on January 16, 2018. Young women and men perched in front of laptops, graffiti murals and coloured-glass walls: the MolenGeek centre in Brussels is straight out of central casting for a movie about Silicon Valley. But the story here is different. For the past two years it has been opening up computer skills and digital entrepreneurship to young people in one of the Belgian capital's most deprived areas. / AFP PHOTO / EMMANUEL DUNAND

MOLENBEEK, Belgium: Young women and men perched in front of laptops, graffiti murals and coloured-glass walls: the MolenGeek centre in Brussels is straight out of central casting for a movie about Silicon Valley. 

But the story here is different. For the past two years it has been opening up computer skills and digital entrepreneurship to young people in one of the Belgian capital’s most deprived areas.