The two brothers were named by local
media to be among the bombers behind the terrorist attacks that killed
more than 30 people and injured 250 more in Brussels.
RTBF, Belgium’s state broadcaster named the brothers Khalid
el-Bakraoui and Brahim, also known as Ibrahim el-Bakraoui as two of the
suspected ISIS militants who blew themselves up amid crowds at Brussels
Airport and on a train at Maalbeek station.
Both were originally reported to have died in the departures
terminal but new Belgian reports alleged that Brahim killed himself at
the airport, while Khalid was on the Metro.
An alert was put out for the pair following a police raid in the
Brussels suburb of Forest last week where two men escaped as a gunman
battled with officers before being shot dead.
Belgium's federal prosecutor named the el-Bakraoui brothers as the
hunt continued after police lost the suspects in a chase over rooftops.
A Kalashnikov, book about Salafism and
Isis flag was found alongside a large quantity of ammunition in the
flat, which Khalid was suspected of renting under a false identity.
A yet unidentified suicide bomber (L) and Brahim el-Bakraoui (R) about to carry out the attack
Khalid was wanted on suspicion of terror offences, Belgian media
reported, and was previously jailed for nine years after shooting at
police during a robbery.
His brother was imprisoned in 2011, a year later, for car-jackings, La Libre reported.
Police are still hunting a third suspected accomplice pictured with
one of the suspected bombers on airport CCTV, named by La Derniere
Heure newspaper as Najim Laachraoui.
Under his alias Soufiane Kayal, the 25-year-old had been wanted for
months as a suspect bomb-maker linked to the Paris attacks after his
DNA was found alongside that of the terrorists who carried out the
massacres at a safe house where traces of explosives and suicide belts
were found.
He rented one of the hide-outs, in Auvelais, where the cell
prepared for the massacres that would kill 130 people in the French
capital.
Laachraoui was picked up in Budapest by Salah Abdeslam, possibly
making his way back from Syria, on 9 September alongside Mohamed
Belkaid, the 35-year-old Algerian killed by police in Forest on 15
March.
The net has been tightening on the remaining accomplices following
Belkaid's death and Abdeslam's eventual arrest on Friday and there was
speculation that Tuesday's attacks were either an act of revenge or the
fulfilment of plots Abdeslam claimed had already been hatched.
The airport explosions, followed little over an hour later by
another blast at a Metro station, left at least 31 dead and 250 wounded.
- Independent
No comments:
Post a Comment