text: Mourad Laachraoui, Belgian Taekwondo athlete and brother of Najim Laachaoui, implicated in the Brussels bombing attacks, addresses a press conference in Brussels, Belgium, March 24, 2016. REUTERS/Christian Hartmann 
   
   A man, who police said is named Najim Laachraoui is seen in this undated photo issued by the Belgian Federal police on their Twitter site, on suspicion of involvement in the Brussels airport attack, on March 23, 2016. REUTERS/Belgian Federal Police/Handout via Reuters 
   
   BRUSSELS Brussels suicide bomber Najim Laachraoui was a nice, intelligent boy, his brother said on Thursday, and gave no warning signs of being radicalised before he left for Syria in 2013 and broke all contact with his family. 
   
   Laachraoui, a 25-year-old Belgian, was one of Tuesday's suicide bombers, security sources have told local media. A veteran Islamist fighter in Syria, he is also suspected of making explosive belts for last November's Paris attacks. 
   
   No one in the family saw any change in his attitude before the day he called them to say he had left for Syria, his 20-year-old brother Mourad said. They also have no clue as to what could have led him to be radicalised, he said. 
   
   "He was a nice boy, and above all he was clever, that's what I remember of him," Mourad said of his brother, who graduated in electromechanics. The last time he saw Najim, he told a news conference, he looked "normal." 
   
   The family warned the police in 2013 when Najim told them he was in Syria, Mourad said. The police visited them at the time and came back to search their home after the November 2015 Paris attacks. 
   
   Mourad, who said he was deeply saddened by the November attacks, said he never saw his brother with their suspected mastermind Abdelhamid Abaaoud, another Belgian, or anyone else involved in the Paris or Brussels carnage. 
   
   Najim was religious, as is the family, Mourad said, adding that he would do everything possible to make sure his three younger siblings still at school do not become radical. 
   
   Mourad is a taekwondo athlete who has represented Belgium in European and world competitions, Belgium's ABFT taekwondo federation said on its website. 
   
   "It's crazy, really - the same parents, the same upbringing, and one turns out really well and the other really bad," his lawyer Philippe Culot said. "Mourad and his whole family are crushed that Najim could have committed such a barbaric act." 
   
   "You don't choose your family," Mourad remarked. 
   
   Authorities have not officially said that Najim is dead and his family has had no confirmation either, Mourad told journalists. 
   
   "VERY GOOD STUDENT" 
   
   Najim Laachraoui was a model student in a Brussels Catholic high school, its director told Reuters earlier on Thursday. 
   
   "Najim Laachraoui was a very good student," said Veronica Pellegrini, the director of the Institut de la Sainte Famille d'Helmet, a Catholic school in the ethnically mixed east Brussels borough of Schaerbeek. 
   
   "He never failed a class," Pellegrini said of Laachraoui, who studied at the school for six years, until graduating in 2009. "We haven't heard from him since," she said. 
   
   Traveling under the false name Soufiane Kayal, Laachraoui was documented driving from Hungary into Austria in September in a car driven by Salah Abdeslam, the prime suspect in the Paris attacks who was arrested in Brussels last week. 
   
   There is speculation Laachraoui had just returned from Syria, possibly by sea with refugees. 
   
   Catholic religion classes are part of the school's curriculum for all students regardless of their religion and Laachraoui would have attended those classes as any other student, Pellegrini said. 
   
   It is not uncommon for Muslim pupils in Belgium to go to Catholic schools, which can be seen as more conservative or more exclusive than state schools. 
   
   (Reporting by Ingrid Melander; Editing by Tom Heneghan) ||||| Play Facebook 
   
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   BRUSSELS — One of the suicide bombers who blew themselves up at Brussels airport was the suspected bomb-maker involved in November's Paris attacks, Belgian officials announced on Friday. 
   
   The federal prosecutor confirmed that 24-year-old Najim Laachraoui was the bomber pictured on the left of a surveillance camera image captured before the twin blasts rocked the departures area on Tuesday. He was pushing a luggage trolley that contained a bomb hidden in a suitcase. 
   
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   Laachraoui is suspected of being the bomb-maker who supplied devices for the Paris attacks on Nov. 13. 
   
   The prosecutor also confirmed Friday that Laachraoui's DNA was found on a suicide belt at the Bataclan music venue that was targeted by the terrorists along with an explosive device at the Stade de France. 
   
   Najim Laachraoui (left) is seen in footage from a security camera at Brussels airport on Tuesday. Belgian Police 
   
   His DNA was also recovered at several safe houses in Belgium used by the cell. 
   
   Laachraoui also used the false name Soufiane Kayal and was with suspected Paris attacker Salah Abdeslam in Hungary in Sept. 2015, according to the prosecutor. 
   
   U.S. and Belgian intelligence sources previously told NBC News that Laachraoui was believed to be among the Brussels suicide bombers, but Friday was the first time his involvement in the attacks had been publicly acknowledged by officials.
target: – One of the two suicide bombers that killed at least 30 people at the Brussels airport Tuesday was the same man who made two of the bombs used in the terrorist attacks on Paris in November, authorities confirmed Friday. The New York Times identified the man as 24-year-old Belgian citizen Najim Laachraoui. Laachraoui's DNA was found on a suicide belt at the Bataclan music venue and an explosive device at the Stade du France following the Paris attacks, NBC News reports. Authorities asked for help finding him on Monday, three days after they arrested Paris attacker and suspected accomplice Salah Abdeslam. On Tuesday, Laachraoui used a bomb hidden in a suitcase to blow himself up at the Brussels airport. Laachraoui left Belgium for Syria in 2013, Reuters reports. His family says it saw no sign of radicalization beforehand and has no idea what happened. Laachraoui's family warned police after he left for Syria. His brother, 20-year-old Mourad, remembers his brother as "nice" and "clever." "Mourad and his whole family are crushed that Najim could have committed such a barbaric act," Reuters quotes Mourad's lawyer as saying. Mourad, who represents Belgium in international taekwondo competitions, says he will do whatever it takes to keep his three younger siblings from following his brother's path.