Ian Black: Inside Europe

Ex-dictators, generals and alleged war criminals looking for a last-minute summer break can think about Belgium again now that the government has scrapped its controversial "genocide law". Fear of being collared for war crimes committed anywhere on earth meant that the likes of US General Tommy Franks, Fidel Castro, Ariel Sharon, Yasser Arafat and assorted Rwandans have been forced to give a wide berth to the land of moules frites. Even Tony Blair was accused of atrocities at one point, but didn't bother staying away.

The Belgian law may have seemed like a good idea, but no one took it very seriously: what right has one small country - and one with a nasty colonial past - to set itself up as an arbiter of universal justice, especially now the permanent international criminal court is up and running in the Hague?

The Americans didn't like it at all and threatened to move Nato HQ somewhere more welcoming. But there were strong objections from ICC supporters like Britain, which argued that setting universal standards for war crimes was difficult enough without unnecessary duplication.

Still, you don't need to be accused of serial human rights abuses to consider a Belgian holiday. Brits accustomed to using "Brussels" as a term of Europhobic abuse may find the city worth a closer look. The Grand Place is a jewel of medieval architecture; you have to try consciously to eat badly, and the fabled beer and chocolate are far more than tourist gimmicks.

Then there are the cows - eye-catching herds of multicoloured fibreglass bovines all over town. In homage to local surrealist hero René Magritte, one bears the legend: "This is not a cow."

The EU is now on its month-long holiday, so the unlovely quartier européen is eerily quiet without the usual round of briefings, summits and French farmers demonstrating against subsidy cuts. Even a Silvio Berlusconi gaffe might go unnoticed in August.

Holiday time means even more roadworks and traffic jams than usual. The spontaneous appearance of a large hole in the middle of Rue Belliard - Bernard Cribbins would have loved Belgian road-menders - meant that the tanks could not be deployed for the national day parade for fear of plunging into the abyss.

If you want to venture further afield, French-speaking Wallonia has lovely walks and gentle kayaking on the Lesse and Semois. Head north, and a 40-minute drive takes you to Antwerp, now a chic centre for cutting-edge couture. Busy Bruges is a must, but so is unfashionable western Flanders where the lovingly tended cemeteries of the first world war remind us what European integration was supposed to be about in the first place.

Just a tram-ride from central Brussels is the incomparable Foret de Soignes - vast beech woods with shady glades with ancient Flemish names: a paradise on foot and two wheels. In the land of the legendary Eddy Merckx, bike sales actually overtook car sales this year - another reason why Belgians spend more on holiday and recreation than any other Europeans.

Happily, Belgium has been spared the fires that have devastated southern France, but months of almost unbroken hot weather have reinforced the uncanny feeling that this normally rainy northern European country has a very southern, below-the-olive-belt attitude to time and order.

You don't have to be Europhile to like Belgium, but it helps. Roy Jenkins, onetime British president of the European commission - remembered as Roi Jean Quinze - was fond of Brussels, though he was honest enough to characterise it as "une vraie ville bourgeoise" rather than a great "world city" like Paris or London. Fair enough, but quite a compliment anyway for this much-maligned place. Bonnes vacances!