Advertisement

Brussels airport suicide bombing brothers named

Updated 08.35 The two suspected suicide bombers who attacked Brussels airport yesterday...
Newstalk
Newstalk

07.36 23 Mar 2016


Share this article


Brussels airport suicide bombi...

Brussels airport suicide bombing brothers named

Newstalk
Newstalk

07.36 23 Mar 2016


Share this article


Updated 08.35

The two suspected suicide bombers who attacked Brussels airport yesterday have been named.

Brothers Khalid and Ibrahim El Bakraoui were known to police, but for organised crime offences not terrorism.

Advertisement

They are believed to have blown themselves up in the departures area - taking 14 people with them.

Khalid had rented under a false identity the house raided by police last week, in an operation that led to the arrest of Paris attacks suspect Salah Abdeslam.

Meanwhile, Police are hunting for fugitive suspect and suspected bombmaker Najim Laachraoui (24).

He was seen in CCTV footage from the airport wearing a hat and pushing a luggage trolley alongside the brothers, before the airport explosions.

Laachraoui is reported to have fled the airport after his bomb failed to detonate.

34 people died and 200 more were injured in three bomb blasts at Brussels airport and Metro yesterday.

All pictures from Police Federale, Belgium's police force, via Twitter

Two of the three men wearing single gloves to conceal detonators.

The explosives were contained in their luggage and detonated before reaching the security gate, according to Zaventem's mayor.

Taxi driver led Police to nail bomb

Following the Brussels attacks, a taxi driver told police he had picked up three suspicious customers - and took investigators to a house in the Brussels suburb of Schaerbeek, where he had collected them, according to Belgium's HLN newspaper.

It was in that house where police found a nail bomb, chemical products and an Islamic State flag - but no sign of Laachraoui, the fugitive who is now Belgium's most wanted man.

Authorities have launched an international manhunt for Laachraoui (pictured below), who is already wanted in connection with last November's attacks in Paris.

His DNA was found on suicide belts used in the Bataclan Theatre and the Stade de France.

All pictures from Police Federale, Belgium's police force, via Twitter

Security agencies say the terror threat level in Brussels remain at four, and the airport is closed until further notice.

Belgium begins three days of national mourning today, and a minute's silence will be held later.

At home, flags will be flown at half mast on government buildings as a mark of respect.


Share this article


Most Popular