EU struggles to understand what drives people to join terror cells, writes Sorcha Ní Coileain

Belgian police have arrested seven people and German authorities arrested two in separate investigations into IS suicide bombings in Brussels, while authorities in France said they thwarted a militant plot there “that was at an advanced stage”.

In the wake of the horrific attack at the Brussels airport and a metro station, there were immediate calls for more information sharing and greater co-ordination among the world’s intelligence agencies to detect terrorist plots before they can be executed, writes David Wise

A Frenchman has been arrested in the “advanced stages” of a plot to attack the country.

A second attacker is suspected of taking part in the bombing this week of a Brussels subway train and may be at large, according to Belgian and French media reports, amid signs that the same Islamic State (IS) network was behind the attacks in Brussels and bloodshed in Paris last year.

Suicide bombers who blew themselves up in Brussels were originally considering an attack on a nuclear site in Belgium, but arrests started last week may have forced them to switch to targets in the Belgian capital, the DH newspaper said.

While the bombings in Paris and Brussels are being seen as an attack on Europe as a whole, forging a collective EU response to global terrorism will be very difficult, writes Lucian Kim

EVERY terror attack by Islamic extremists provokes anger and the incomprehension religious fanaticism generates in a largely pluralist, liberal, and increasingly irreligious Western world.

A Frenchman has been arrested in the "advanced stages" of a plot to attack the country.

One of the suicide bombers behind Tuesday’s terror attack left a note on a computer claiming he was being “hunted everywhere”.

The Belgian government warned at the weekend that there might be an attack after the security services captured their most wanted man. It came swiftly.

President Michael D Higgins has urged people not to let terrorists believe they can strike fear into lives.

Muslim leaders in Ireland have united to condemn the Brussels attacks but have urged people to view all terror atrocities, including recently in Turkey, as equally appalling.

The identities of victims of the twin terror attacks in Brussels have started to trickle through.

Belgium’s chief prosecutor yesterday named two brothers as Islamic State suicide bombers involved in the most deadly attacks in Brussels’ history.

US Republican presidential candidate, Donald Trump, said Muslims were not helping to prevent attacks such as those that killed at least 30 people in Belgium, drawing a rebuke from Muslim groups.

THE reaction by security services around the world to the Belgian bombings has been understandable and predictable.

Frightened people will turn to the national authorities they know and may increasingly see Europe, not as the answer, but as the problem — even the threat, writes John Lloyd

After an attack such as that seen in Belgium, what follows is rather predictable. Trump and right-wing parties will likely reap the rewards, writes Peter Apps

A Cork woman has told of how she thought she and her family were going to die in Tuesday’s bombing of Brussels Airport.

Questions have been raised about the capability of the Belgian police and intelligence services, in the wake of the atrocities in Brussels.

Gardaí are understood to be monitoring the reaction of radicals here to the bombing attacks in Brussels.

President Michael D Higgins will sign a book of condolences for the victims of the Brussels attacks this morning at the Belgian embassy in Dublin.

“Everywhere there were bodies with no heads. There was a woman screaming while she was holding her baby and she screamed: ‘Where is my baby?’ I told her she was holding her child but she said she had one other that she couldn’t find.”

An Iraqi intelligence official says sources in the Syrian city of Raqqa have told them that the Islamic State group has been planning terrorist attacks in Europe for two months which would “target airports and train stations”.

Gardaí are monitoring “a small number of people” but have stressed the threat level here remains low.

An Irishman has recounted how he narrowly avoided the bombing of a Brussels metro station yesterday morning, having just dropped his daughter off to crèche.

A Galway man has described the “surreal” evacuation of Brussels Airport yesterday morning, and said the panic caused by the explosions resulted in a stampede as people tried to escape the departure gates.

The head of Maynooth University Department of Anthropology, Mark Maguire, says security on its own isn’t a sufficient response to terror, and explains his research into how we humans react to such incidents    

The attacks in Brussels fit into a pattern of a concerted campaign against institutions and activities that the West regards as central to its values and ideals, writes Cormac O’Keeffe

A manhunt has been launched for one of the terrorists behind coordinated bombings in Brussels which left 34 dead and almost 200 injured.

US President Barack Obama has said the terror attacks in Brussels are a reminder of the need to unite "in fighting against the scourge of terrorism".

The National Security Council is meeting this afternoon to review Ireland's security arrangements following the Brussels attacks.

Eyewitnesses have described "chaos" as they ran from the sound of explosions during suspected terrorist bomb attacks in Brussels.

Latest: Belgian police hunting for third bomber and are carrying out raids across Belgium.