Belgian police have identified multiple suspects who they say are responsible for explosions at an airport and a metro station in Brussels Tuesday morning.
The Associated Press reported that police “conducted raids into the night and circulated a photo of three men seen in the airport suspected of involvement,” and that Belgian state broadcaster RTBF identified two of the suspects as brothers Khalid and Brahim El-Bakraoui.
RTBF also reportedly claimed that the two El-Bakraoui brothers involved in the attacks acted as suicide bombers, with Brahim El-Bakraoui at Brussels’ Zaventem airport, and Khalid El-Bakraoui at the Maelbeek metro station.
The news agency noted that while the brothers had criminal records for armed robbery charges, they were not known as suspected terrorists. Khalid El-Bakraoui reportedly rented one of the apartments raided by police in their search for Salah Abdeslam, a suspect in the Paris terrorist attacks, who was arrested four days before the attacks in Brussels, and was linked to the Islamic State.
As previously reported, Islamic State militants claimed responsibility for the attacks in Brussels, claiming that “Islamic State fighters carried out a series of bombings with explosive belts and devices on Tuesday, targeting an airport and a central metro station in the center of the Belgian capital Brussels.”
Belgian prosecutor Frederic Van Leeuw said Wednesday that police found a computer with a will left by Brahim El-Bakraoui, and that two other men captured on CCTV at the airport with Brahim have not been identified.
Reuters reported that although Belgian media reported that Najim Laachraoui, a prime suspect in the airport bombings, was detained Wednesday, they later reported that the person arrested was misidentified.
The AP reported that Belgian police have been searching for Laachraoui since last week, because he is “a suspected accomplice of Abdeslam,” and he is “believed to have made the suicide vests used in the Paris attacks.”
While the death toll is currently at 34 with 260 wounded, Health Minister Maggie De Block said that it will likely rise, due to the fact that some of the victims of the bomb blasts were blown to pieces and it is hard for officials to identify them.
