Police rule out suspect in Moscow airport bombing

The ethnic Russian man police believed could have been the suicide bomber at Moscow's Domodedovo Airport has been cleared by DNA analysis, according to sources close to the investigation.

On Thursday, the Kommersant newspaper named 32-year-old Vitaly Razdobudko as the prime suspect in Monday's bombing, which killed 35 people. Mr Razdobudko, a Muslim convert, went missing from his home in the Stavropol region in southern Russia in October; police believe he may be linked to the Nogai Brigade, one of many interlinked terrorist cells operating in Russia's troubled North Caucasus region.

The Life News website reported that police have now ruled out the possibility that Mr Razdobudko was the bomber, after comparing DNA samples from his parents with the remains found at the site. It also reported that his features do not match video footage from the scene.

Police have not cleared him completely, though, and believe that a group of terrorists, possibly including Mr Razdobudko, arrived in Moscow before New Year.