Brussels attacks: Three detained in raids, one of them shot in the leg
Paris attacks accused Salah Abdeslam has refused to talk to authorities about Tuesday's operation, the Belgian justice minister has said.
Belgian authorities detained three suspects during city-wide raids on Friday following the terror attacks in the city that killed more than 30. According to The Associated Press, some of those might have links with a Frenchman who was plotting new attack. According to Telegraph, one of the suspects was sitting with a young girl and holding a bag, when he was reportedly shot in the leg at a tram stop. The bag was believed to contain explosives. Investigators on Friday also confirmed that the second suicide bomber at Brussels airport was Najim Laachraoui.
Early on Friday, a Jet Airways flight carrying 214 passengers and 28 crew members, who were stranded in Belgium, landed in New Delhi. The two Jet Airways crew members injured in the attacks are still in Brussels. An Infosys employee, who went missing after the blasts, has not been found yet. The Indian government said it has stepped up efforts to find Raghavendran Ganesan. According to The Times of India, Ganesan's Bhayandar-based family said he used to take the metro route that was attacked by the Islamic State militants on Tuesday. His name is not on the official the list of victims.
On Thursday, the Belgian Police had arrested six people in connection with the attacks that left 35 people dead and several injured. BBC reported that the arrests were made in the Schaerbeek district, though their identities and links to the attacks have not been confirmed yet. French investigators also arrested one suspect near Paris who, they said, was plotting an attack. The recent explosions have been linked to the Paris attacks in November. Both attacks were claimed by the Islamic State militant group.
On Thursday, Belgium admitted it had made "errors" in connection with one of the Brussels attackers, who had been deported by Turkey in June 2015. This came after Turkey said it had warned the European country that the suspect in question was a "foreign fighter", but they chose to ignore it. The Belgian interior and justice ministers said they had offered to resign over this but added that the prime minister refused to let them. AFP reported that two of the attackers were also on terrorist lists in the United States.
Police is still looking for the third suspect in the attack who has been caught on CCTV at the airport, along with the two other suicide bombers, just before the explosions. The director of the EU's police agency said the network of jihadists in Europe is "more extensive than perhaps we first feared". Robert Wainwright said there were concerns about "a community of 5,000 suspects that have been radicalised in Europe, that have travelled to Syria and Iraq for conflict experience, some of whom – not all – have since come back to Europe".