Authorities in St. Petersburg and Moscow expand search

ST. PETERSBURG - Russian investigators on Thursday detained eight people suspected of involvement in Wednesday's bombing of the St. Petersburg metro as the nation held memorials to honor the 13 victims.

Russia's Investigative Committee issued a statement saying: "Six people were detained in St. Petersburg and two in Moscow who are involved in the act of terror."

The investigation and search operation is being coordinated by the FSB security service and the Interior Ministry.

During their searches, investigators discovered an explosive device "identical" to the one found at a St. Petersburg metro station before the deadly blast in a metro tunnel, said the statement.

Firearms and ammunition were also found at residences of the suspects, the Investigative Committee said.

Investigators said earlier on Thursday they had searched the apartments of "several citizens of Central Asian republics, who had been in contact" with suspected bomber Akbarjon Djalilov, thought to be a Russian national born in Kyrgyzstan.

The Investigative Committee said objects "relevant to the investigation" had been confiscated but did not disclose their nature.

As the probe into the bombing expanded, thousands of people gathered in Moscow and St. Petersburg to remember the victims.

People clutching flowers and white balloons gathered at a rally outside St. Petersburg's Technological Institute metro station, one of the two stations at the heart of the attack.

"I came to show that we will not be frightened," said 48-year-old Valentina Zlobina. "We will become more united in this tragedy."

In Moscow, singers serenaded a crowd of several thousand next to the walls of the Kremlin at an event carried live on state TV that included public transport workers and prominent pro-Kremlin lawmakers.

No one has yet claimed responsibility for the blast that tore through a subway carriage in Russia's second city on Monday.

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

Investigative Committee chief Alexander Bastrykin has ordered officials to look into any potential links between the alleged attacker and the Islamic State group.

IS extremists have repeatedly threatened an attack on Russian soil.

While the wait continued for any claims of responsibility for the St. Petersburg blast, IS on Thursday said it was behind a separate attack that killed two Russian traffic police in the southern city of Astrakhan this week.

At a cemetery outside St. Petersburg, distraught relatives and friends held the first funeral for one of the victims of the metro attack.

Dozens of people carrying flowers and weeping gathered in a village on the city's outskirts for the funeral of 50-year-old doll maker Irina Medyantseva who was on the metro with her daughter Yelena, who is now recovering in hospital.

"We had just bought an apartment near here in a beautiful building, our daughters were doing well, and then this happened," grieving widower Alexander Kaminsky said.

"You can't process what happened in your mind," said colleague Svetlana Koroleva. "Only a monster could kill innocent people."

Russia endured a wave of brutal attacks in the 1990s and 2000s, blamed mainly on a rebellion in Chechnya that morphed from a separatist uprising into an extremist insurgency.

IS claimed responsibility for blowing up a passenger jet packed with vacationers returning to St. Petersburg from Egypt in October 2015, killing all 224 people onboard.

Xinhua - AP