US officials have travelled to the Russian republic of Dagestan to quiet the parents of the Boston Marathon bombing suspects. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-22277541  The suspects’ parents, Anzor and Zubeidat Tsarnaev, have said they believe they are innocent and were framed by US security forces. The interior minister of Dagestan has denied that the dead suspect became a follower of radical Islam while staying in the republic, Russia’s Interfax news agency reports. Abdurashid Magomedov said the allegations were “an attempt to shift the blame”, and that there is no record of him having contact with the “bandit underground” in the region.
The suspects had been living in the US for about a decade at the time of the attack, but in 2012, Tamerlan Tsarnaev returned to Russia. He spent six months in Chechnya and bordering Dagestan.
It was unclear exactly which US officials were carrying out the interviews, but an embassy official told the AFP news agency: “The FBI is receiving co-operation from the Russian government in its investigation of the Boston Marathon bombing.”
Meanwhile, US law enforcement agencies are facing questions at home over whether they could have done more to prevent the 15 April attacks, and whether the FBI failed to act on Russian concerns.

Anonymous officials have told US media that 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev said he and his 26-year-old brother had planned the attack themselves without help from foreign militants.