Two suspected suicide bombers blew themselves up today following a police raid on a house in a Casablanca slum in which a third man was shot dead, police sources said.
The third man had been on the run since the dawn raid in Fida neighbourhood in which one suspected Islamist militant was killed by police and an accomplice blew himself up after he was trapped on a roof terrace, police sources and witnesses said.
Police have been looking for up to 12 suspected suicide bombers since March 11th when the alleged leader of a suicide squad detonated his explosives belt in a cybercafe to stop police arresting him, the sources added.
They said they believed the bombers had started wearing the belts all the time to stop security forces taking them alive.
Residents said police had cordoned off part of Fida, a poor working-class suburb of Morocco's economic capital, and were trying to trace the third suspect who had managed to escape.
The MAP state news agency said two police officers were injured, one seriously, when the third suspect blew himself up.
Hundreds of onlookers were near the house that was raided and a forensic investigation team sifted through debris after the first bomb blast.