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Investigative Committee names man behind St. Petersburg metro blast

The Investigative Committee spokeswoman has confirmed that a passenger whose identity has been established could have triggered the bomb in the train car

© EPA/ANATOLY MALTSEV

MOSCOW, April 4. /TASS/. Russia’s Investigative Committee has named the man who detonated the bomb on a St. Petersburg metro train on Monday afternoon. The man's name is Akbardjon Djalilov, he was born in 1995, IC spokesman Svetlana Petrenko said.

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Bomb technicians have preliminarily identified the trigger mechanism of an explosive device defused at the Ploshchad Vosstaniya subway station after a terror attack in the St. Petersburg metro system, the law enforcement agencies told TASS on Tuesday.

A person who carried out an explosion in the St. Petersburg subway left a bomb at the Ploshchad Vosstaniya metro station, Petrenko has confirmed.

"The findings of the genetic expert study and video camera footage give investigators the grounds to believe that precisely the person who committed a terror attack in a train car left a bag with an explosive device at the Ploshchad Vosstaniya metro station," the spokeswoman said.

"Preliminary analysis has shown that the explosive was placed in a fire extinguisher and was filled with striking elements in the form of small metal balls and nuts, like the exploded bomb. It was expected to be triggered by a mobile phone rather than by a timing mechanism," a source told TASS earlier.

"This is why mobile phone communication was switched off. Soon after that, the explosive with a blast equivalent to 1 kg of TNT was defused", the source added.

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St. Petersburg bombing: what we know so far

Specialists are continuing to study the exploded bomb and the remains of a suspected suicide bomber, the source said.

The detonated bomb was similar by its filling to the explosive device defused at the Ploshchad Vosstaniya subway station and had the same striking elements. It has been reported earlier that the suspect was a Central Asian who had ties with Syrian militants.

"He was in the train’s third carriage near the doors, judging by the damage to the wagon. When the train started moving, an explosive device with a power equivalent to 200-300g of TNT was detonated. The blast wave actually smashed the wagon’s door but the train driver who was acting strictly under operational instructions did not stop the movement and drove to the next station. Several bodies were found in the tunnel as they were blown out of the train," a source told TASS.

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