Halle-Vilvoorde administrative Arrondissement

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Arrondissement of Halle-Vilvoorde
Location of the arrondissement in Flemish Brabant
Country	Belgium
Region	Flemish Region
Province	Flemish Brabant
Area	942.93 km²
Population	576,008 (01/01/2006)
Municipalities	35

The Halle-Vilvoorde Arrondissement is one of the two administrative arrondissements in the Belgian province of Flemish Brabant. It almost completely surrounds the Brussels-Capital Region and lies to the west of the other arrondissement in the province, the Leuven Arrondissement. Unlike the Arrondissement of Leuven, it is not a judicial arrondissement.

The Halle-Vilvoorde Arrondissement and the Brussels-Capital Region together form the Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde electoral district and the Judicial Arrondissement of Brussels. Following the 2007 federal election, Yves Leterme, who is in charge of the negotiations for forming a new Federal Government, proposed to split up the Judicial Arrondissement of Brussels into two judicial arrondissements: one comprising Halle-Vilvoorde and the other comprising the Brussels Region.

[edit] History

The Arrondissement of Halle-Vilvoorde was established in 1963 when the language borders were determined. At that time, the then Administrative Arrondissement of Brussels, which had the same territory as the present-day Judicial Arrondissement of Brussels, was split into three administrative arrondissements, two of which still exist today:

Brussels-Capital, which consists of the 19 municipalities of the Brussels Region;
Halle-Vilvoorde, a unilingual Dutch-speaking administrative arrondissement;
Brussels-Periphery, which consisted of the six Flemish municipalities with language facilities for French-speakers around Brussels.

On January 1, 1971, the Arrondissement of Brussels-Periphery ceased to exist and its municipalities were added to Halle-Vilvoorde.

In 1977, the then municipality of Muizen ceased to exist and was ceded to the Arrondissement of Mechelen, in the Province of Antwerp.