Image copyright Reuters Image caption Monday's bombing injured 50 people

Eight people are being held in connection with the bombing on St Petersburg metro, Russian investigators have confirmed.

The arrests - six in Moscow, two in St Petersburg - came three days after 13 people were killed in the attack.

Earlier on Thursday, an explosive device was made safe in a flat in St Petersburg by Russian police.

Neighbours were moved away and witnesses told local media they saw men led out in handcuffs.

The main suspect in the metro bombing, Akbarzhon Jalilov, also died in the explosion.

He was aged 22 and from the Central Asian republic of Kyrgyzstan. His remains were identified by his parents on Wednesday, and by DNA testing.

Russian investigators are examining tape, tin foil and some other suspicious items found at Jalilov's St Petersburg flat.

Russia's Investigative Committee (SK) says they appear similar to components found in a device left at Ploshchad Vosstaniya metro station on the day of the bombing.

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption The bomb went off between two stations but the driver continued to Tekhnologichesky Institut

The flat raided at around 05:00 local time (02:00 GMT) on Thursday was in Tovarishchesky Prospekt in the east of St Petersburg.

"An explosive device found in the flat has been made safe. Several suspects have been arrested; they didn't resist and there's now no threat to local people," the head of the local authority Konstantin Serov was quoted as saying.

Sources told Interfax news agency that investigators were examining possible links between the men and the alleged bomber.

Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Ulvi Fatullayev describes the moments after Monday's blast

Russia's Investigative Committee (SK) said on Thursday they had established that "several citizens of Central Asian republics were in contact with Jalilov".

Eight people from Central Asia were also arrested in the city on Wednesday as part of the metro bomb investigation. The SK said they were held for allegedly recruiting for Islamist militant groups such as so-called Islamic State and Jabhat al-Nusra since 2015, and "committing crimes of a terrorist nature".

The SK has named the 13 people who died, aside from Jalilov, on Monday afternoon after the train had left Sennaya Ploshchad station. About 50 injured are being treated in hospital.

The dead were named as:</s>MOSCOW - Eight people suspected of involvement in the Saint Petersburg metro bombing were detained Thursday, Russia’s Investigative Committee said.

“Six people were detained in Saint Petersburg and two in Moscow who are involved in the act of terror” following an investigation and search operation conducted with the FSB security service and interior ministry, the committee said in a statement.

Investigators said they discovered, in one of the suspects’ residences, an explosive device “identical” to the one found at a Saint Petersburg metro station that was discovered shortly before another device exploded in a tunnel killing 13 people. They also recovered firearms and ammunition from the suspects’ residences, the committee said.

The committee said a court will soon rule on detention measures for the eight suspects, who seem to bear Central Asian names.

Investigators said earlier Thursday that they had raided the flat of “several citizens of Central Asian republics, who had been in contact” with the suspected bomber, 22-year-old Akbarjon Djalilov.

They confiscated other objects “relevant to the investigation” at his acquaintances’ flat but did not disclose their nature.

Investigators said Djalilov — believed to be a Russian citizen born in the Central Asian nation of Kyrgyzstan — had set off a bomb in a train carriage travelling between two busy Saint Petersburg metro stations on Monday afternoon.

His remains were found at the site of the blast and traces of his DNA were also discovered on a bag containing the bomb at another metro station that was successfully defused, investigators said.

No one has so far claimed responsibility for the attack.

The head of Russia’s Investigative Committee Alexander Bastrykin has ordered officials to look into any potential “links” between the alleged attacker and the Islamic State group.

Jihadists from IS - which includes foreign fighters from ex-Soviet Central Asia and the Caucasus region - have repeatedly threatened an attack on Russian soil in revenge for Moscow’s military backing of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad.</s>Russian law enforcement agencies are checking a suspicious object at an apartment building in Saint Petersburg following a suicide bombing on the city’s subway earlier in the week. Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) said, according to Russian news agencies, that the object found early today in an apartment building on Saint Petersburg’s eastern outskirts could contain explosives. Residents have been evacuated and explosives experts have started working on the site.

Police in the city are on high alert following Monday’s explosion that killed the attacker and 13 other people and wounded some 55. Police yesterday arrested eight Central Asian migrants suspected of acting as recruiters for the Islamic State group and al-Qaida’s Syria branch. The investigators found no immediate evidence of their involvement in the subway attack.</s>ST. PETERSBURG, RUSSIA—Russian security agents on Thursday arrested three people suspected of links to a suicide bomber accused of attacking the city’s subway and deactivated an explosive device in the apartment where they lived.The Investigative Committee said the suspects are residents of the former Soviet Central Asia region like the bomber, 22-year-old Akbarzhon Dzhalilov, a native of Kyrgyzstan. Dzhalilov blew himself up on a busy subway line Monday, killing himself and 13 others and wounding over 50 people.The impoverished, predominantly Muslim countries in Central Asia are seen as fertile ground for Islamic extremists, and thousands of their citizens are believed to have joined Daesh, also known as ISIS or ISIL, in Syria and Iraq.Read more:Suicide bomber behind St. Petersburg subway explosion, Russian investigators sayThe committee, the nation’s top criminal investigation agency, said investigators also found objects that would help advance the probe during a search of the home on St. Petersburg’s eastern outskirts.Article Continued BelowPeople gather to commemorate the victims of the subway blast at The Field of Mars in Saint Petersburg on Wednesday. The bombing killed 13 people and wounded over 50. (OLGA MALTSEVA/AFP/GETTY IMAGES) The Federal Security Service, the main KGB successor agency, said in a statement carried by Russian news agencies that its experts defused a self-made explosive device at the apartment. The news reports said three people were arrested.A leading St. Petersburg news portal, Fontanka.ru, said materials used in the explosive device found Thursday matched those used by militants in Syria.An unidentified law enforcement official told the Tass news agency that investigators were checking information that Dzhalilov may have trained with Daesh in Syria.</s>When an attack on the Saint Petersburg metro claimed the lives of 14 people on Monday, Claire was in Paris. When the French capital was attacked in November 2015, she was in Russia.

Empty, silent, the city steps backwards. Haggard and lost in their thoughts, only a few people cross paths in the street. Their heads are bowed, as if they're ashamed to be seen walking. By the time I arrive at the embassy the rain is falling hard. A small crowd is already forming at the entrance of the building, before a mass of flowers, candles, flags and words of support. They stare admiringly, fixatedly. Tears stream down a few faces, mix with the rain. They offer cards of condolence and children's drawings. There is no room to linger on the Nevsky Prospect, the main thoroughfare of Saint Petersburg. When my turn comes I leave flowers, red carnations, at the embassy entrance. I leave the solemn memorial with the impression of having done too little, of being too far away.

​This memory comes from 14 November, 2015. I'm originally from the Parisian banlieue, but I had left to do a year-long foreign exchange in Russia. The day before, Paris - my home - was the victim of one of the deadliest attacks in French history. Last Monday, after a bomb exploded on the Saint Petersburg metro and killed more than a dozen people, I felt the same unpleasant sensation: I was in the wrong place, at the wrong time. I felt frustrated and guilty: how could I help and show my support if I was a continent away?

I went through the same motions, almost like a ritual. Contact friends and loved ones, to make sure they're OK. Post messages on social media. Follow the news, looking for the tiniest crumb of information. Then, finally, talk to friends about why and how, and what comes next. Today we can do all of that at a distance. Yet it doesn't feel enough. We want to be there, with them. Would it change anything? Probably not. Here or there, what's the difference?

I watch the news and see images of Sennaya Square, and the metro station where the attacks took place. Memories of it come flooding back. What does the square mean to me? It was a messy place, where vendors of chaverma (Russian kebabs), shoe shops and cheap SIM card vendors were squashed against the premises for huge international brands. I can so easily picture myself in that metro. The massive doors opening to me. The message announcing the departure of each train. Next stop: Technological Institute. Then I come back to reality, back to the attacks.

Living an attack from abroad is heartbreaking. Leaving a flower at an embassy, or changing a Facebook profile picture: these actions seem so small and insignificant. They pale in the face of such horrific events. The only thing that seems fitting is to actually be there. To physically show compassions. Share in the collective weight and fear of the moment. Failing that we keep ourselves plugged in, listening to breaking news reports for each new revelation. In doing so we plug ourselves into a reality that feels both distant and familiar. We search for anything to keep connected. We feel helpless, able to offer only anonymous support.</s>Russia’s Investigative Committee on Wednesday said it had detained six “terrorist” recruiters from Central Asia in Saint Petersburg, but insisted there was no proof yet of a link between them and the suspected metro bomber in the city.

The authorities said that those detained had been recruiting people to join groups including the Islamic State “to carry out terrorist crimes” and join “illegal armed groups” abroad.</s>ST PETERSBURG, April 6 (Reuters) - Russian authorities have made safe an explosive device found in a residential building in St Petersburg, the TASS news agency reported on Thursday.

A law enforcement source told Reuters that fire engines had turned up at the building in question and that people living in flats on two stairwells had been evacuated.

The city is still reeling after a bomb ripped through the St Petersburg metro on Monday, killing 14 people. (Reporting by Polina Nikolskaya; Writing by Alexander Winning; Editing by Andrew Osborn)</s>Authorities in the Russian city of St. Petersburg say an explosive device has been discovered in an apartment building and defused.

Officials said they evacuated residents from the building after the device was found on April 6, three days after a bomb blast on a St. Petersburg subway train killed 14 people and injured nearly 50.

Konstantin Serov, head of the city's Nevsky district, said investigators continued to work on the building's eighth and ninth floors after residents on lower floors were allowed to return.

Serov said that the one-room apartment where the device was found was used by people who were not the owners.

Based on reporting by TASS and Interfax</s>SAINT PETERSBURG: The Russian authorities on Friday (Apr 7) charged eight people with terrorism offences following the bomb attack on the Saint Petersburg metro which killed 13 people on Monday.

A court in Saint Petersburg said six suspects, aged 20 to 39, would be held until Jun 2 while the investigation into the attack continued.

They were arrested Thursday, and investigators said they found in one of the suspects' residences an explosive device "identical" to the one found at a metro station that was discovered shortly before another device exploded in a tunnel.

They also recovered firearms and ammunition from the suspects' residences, according to Russia's Investigative Committee. They face charges of terrorism and accessory to terrorism.

Two other suspected accomplices, a man and a woman, were arrested in Moscow on Thursday and have also been charged with terrorism, the TASS news agency said.

One of those, a 24-year-old, had admitted to being in contact with the suspected bomber, 22-year-old Akbarjon Djalilov, according to local press reports.

Djalilov's remains were found at the site of the blast and traces of his DNA were also discovered on a bag containing the bomb at another metro station that was successfully defused, investigators said.

They have not yet determined any motive for the attack, and are looking into possible links with the Islamic State group, though it has not claimed responsibility for the attack.

Security forces also arrested Wednesday in Saint Petersburg seven citizens from Central Asian countries who are suspected of recruiting "terrorists".

But the arrests are not linked to Djalilov "for the moment", the authorities said.</s>Russian authorities have made safe an explosive device found in a residential building in St. Petersburg, the TASS news agency reported on Thursday.

A law enforcement source told Reuters that fire engines had turned up at the building in question and that people living in flats on two stairwells had been evacuated.

The city is still reeling after a bomb ripped through the St. Petersburg metro on Monday, killing 14 people.

An explosion in the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don early Thursday, injured one person, a law enforcement source told TASS.

REN-TV cited witnesses as saying that the explosion happened near a school on Sadovaya Street and that a maintenance worker was injured in the blast.
Russian authorities discover and deactivate an explosive device in a Saint Petersburg flat, during ongoing raids occurring in response to the bombing.