MURDER squad detectives investigating the brutal slaying of Mohammed Karim and his wife Bilquis were today quizzing two people.

The news came on the day police returned to the scene of the killings in a bid to trace vital witnesses exactly a week after the savage attack at Tony's The Jeweller's in Church Street, Preston.

A police spokesman said: "I can confirm that two people have been arrested in connection with the inquiry and are being interviewed at separate police stations today."

Meanwhile police were today handing out leaflets appealing for help at the jeweller's shop where the couple were stabbed to death.

And officers were also talking to passers by in the hope of finding people who were in the area at the time the Blackburn couple were murdered.

The bodies of Mohammed "Tony" Karim, 52, and his 48-year-old wife, of Whalley Old Road, Little Harwood, were discovered in their shop by their sons Shabir and Shafiq around 5pm last Friday.

Police are still trying to trace people who were in the Church Street area of Preston between 2pm and 5pm.

They are also keen to talk to customers who were in the shop along with people who may have been passing the shop on buses. Hundreds of leaflets in English, Urdu, Gujarati were being handed out to shoppers around Church Street and in Blackburn. Detective Inspector Mike Arnold, the leading the 50 strong team of detectives, said: "It is vital that we speak to everyone who was at the scene."

"Someone may have that vital piece of information which may not seem that important to them put could prove to be the breakthrough to us."

Police arrested five people from addresses in Whitebirk and Shadsworth following a series of raids earlier this year. All five were later released without being charged.

Jewellery was seized in the raids and police are trying to discover if it is part of the £30,000 of gold bracelets stolen from the shops by the raiders.

Special information hot-lines have also been set up for people with information. People can ring 01772 618800 or the foreign language line on 01772 618827.

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