Three bombs have exploded in Brussels this morning, two targeting Zaventem Airport and one that struck a subway station in the Maalbeek neighborhood, near several European Union offices. Belgian officials have confirmed that the bombings are terrorist attacks and that at least one of the explosions at the airport was a suicide bomber. At least 21 people have been reported killed so far, according to fire authorities in Brussels. Though the Islamic State has not asserted responsibility for the attack, backers of the group have expressed support for the attacks on social media. The blasts come days after a series of police raids in Brussels last week in which an Algerian militant, Mohamed Belkaid, was killed in a shootout, and Salah Abdeslam, one of the Paris attackers, was arrested. Other militants believed to have been trained in Syria escaped the raids, and yesterday reporting on Abdeslam’s interrogation noted that Belgian authorities had discovered the Islamic State’s operations in Europe were larger than previously realized.
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