African news : breaking news, features, analysis
Egypt launches inquiry into bomb claims
Egypt has launched its own inquiry into whether a bomb may have been placed on the Russian airliner that crashed in Sinai, killing all 224 people on board.
Advertisement
A senior Egyptian official - who asked not to be named - told the BBC that every lead was now being followed up.
However, Egypt stresses that the official investigation into the crash of the Airbus 321 is not yet finished.
Some Western experts have suggested militants in the Sinai Peninsula could have bombed the plane on October 31.
Sinai Province, a group affiliated to Islamic State has repeatedly claimed it brought down the Metrojet Flight 9268, flying from the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh to the Russian city of St Petersburg.
The UK halted flights to and from Sharm el-Sheikh last Wednesday, citing intelligence concerns.
Russia - who initially criticised London's move - later announced it was stopping all flights to Egypt and flying some 80,000 Russian holidaymakers back home. Most of the victims on board the Metrojet airliner were Russian nationals.
Meanwhile, Egyptian officials said yesterday that Ashraf Gharabli, a leader of Sinai Province, had died in a shootout in Cairo after security forces tried to arrest him.
Western officials say there is a strong possibility that a bomb exploded on the plane, though there has been no indication that Gharabli himself was involved.
Yesterday, an Egyptian official told the BBC's security correspondent Frank Gardner that the country's intelligence service was looking into every possibility of how someone could have placed a bomb inside the luggage compartment of the plane.
The official said this included going through CCTV footage from the airport's baggage area, which had not yet revealed anything suspicious, and questioning employees.
Western counter-terrorism experts suspect that jihadists were able to penetrate airport security to target the plane, and there is a belief that Islamic State's affiliate in Sinai may have been able to bribe an airport employee, the BBC correspondent says.