Officials at the airport, which typically handles 600 flights daily, said it would remain shut down until at least Saturday.
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The death toll in the attacks on the Belgian capital, home to the European Union and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, rose to at least 31 with about 260 wounded, Health Minister Maggie De Block said on VRT television.
She said Abdeslam should have had little difficulty organizing more recruits following his November escape from France.
A third man also travelling with them, Mohamed Belkaid, was shot dead during last week’s raids.
On Tuesday Belgian prosecutor Frédéric Van Leeuw said it was “too early to establish a direct link” between the Brussels bombers and the three jihadist teams who killed 130 in Paris.
Dutch officials Thursday confirmed that one of the Brussels airport suicide bombers was expelled by Turkey and sent to the Netherlands past year, but stressed he had been unknown to Dutch law enforcement.
The federal prosecutor said it had issued an worldwide arrest warrant in December for terrorism offences for Belgian national Khalid El Bakraoui, who attacked Maalbeek station in Tuesday’s attacks, while his brother Ibrahim bombed Brussels airport.
Belgian authorities are continuing to investigate the bombings; police rounded up six people Thursday night in connection with the attacks.
RTBF said Khalid El Bakraoui had rented under a false name the apartment in the city’s Forest borough, where police hunting Abdeslam killed a gunman in a raid last week.
At the time, Belgian authorities replied that Bakraoui, who had skipped parole after serving less than half of a 9-year sentence for armed robbery, was a criminal but not a militant. “At that time, he was not known here for terrorism”, Mr. Geens said.
“We are looking at large numbers of foreign fighters who have returned as potential terrorists”, he said.
“You can ask how it came about that someone was let out so early and that we missed the chance to seize him when he was in Turkey. And the other guy reached for it like he was saying: No, I’ll take it”, the neighbor said. “In the circumstances, it was right to take political responsibility and I offered my resignation to the prime minister”.
It is clear that some of the Brussels attackers had been on the run from authorities in France and Belgium but were still able to hide in safe houses, assemble bombs and carry out linked attacks.
Belgian public broadcaster VRT said on Thursday that Paris attacks suspect Salah Abdeslam, arrested last week, was planning a multiple shooting and suicide bomb attack in Brussels similar to those in Paris in November.
One man was killed in a shootout with police on March 15 that led to the discovery of assault weapons and explosives and the arrest of Abdeslam, 26, and another suspect on March 18.
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Several U.S. officials say that security cooperation has been hampered by patchy intelligence-sharing by Brussels and wide differences in the willingness of different agencies to work with foreign countries, even close allies. Abdeslam’s lawyer, Sven Mary, told reporters at the courthouse that he asked for a one-month delay on any transfer while he studies the large dossier, but that Abdeslam “wants to explain himself in France, so it’s a good thing”. On Friday morning, a US official said two Americans were among the dead, The Associated Press reports.
