Washington shooting suspect worked with CIA in Afghanistan, victims photos released

The U.S. Attorney for Washington, D.C. Jeanine Pirro has identified the injured Guardsmen as Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and Andrew Wolfe, 24, and said they were still in critical condition following surgeries

She added that said they had been sworn in as National Guards fewer than 24 hours before the shooting.

The suspect, who was wounded in an exchange of gunfire before he was arrested, had worked with U.S. partner forces during the war in Afghanistan.

Investigators are now also studying that aspect of his background as part of the "broad-based international terrorism investigation," Patel said. 

The suspect was identified by the Department of Homeland Security as Rahmanullah Lakanwal, an Afghan national.

The FBI Director Kash Patel has said that the FBI has tracked down the last known address of the suspect and executed a search warrant. 

He said some interviews "were conducted with all the people found at the residence and some more interviews were ongoing". 

He also says that numerous electronic devices taken from the home were being analysed.

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services said earlier that it had stopped processing all immigration requests relating to Afghan nationals indefinitely, after two National Guard soldiers were critically wounded in Washington.

The shooting happened in downtown Washington, D.C., in what officials described as a targeted ambush.

The suspect, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, a 29-year-old Afghan national from Washington State, was taken into custody after suffering gunshot wounds during the attack. 

U.S. President Donald Trump said that the shooting near the White House was "an act of terror," saying the suspect came from Afghanistan in 2021.

The move follows Trump's call for his government to re-examine Afghan immigrants who entered the United States when Joe Biden was President.

"The protection and safety of our homeland and of the American people remains our singular focus and mission," the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services said in a post on X.

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