The two suspects in the Boston marathon bombing were from the Russian region near Chechnya, sources say, as a massive police manhunt continues for the surviving suspect, Belfast Telegraph reported.

One of the two men died in a shootout with police after the suspects shot dead an MIT police officer, injured a transit officer in a firefight and threw explosive devices at police during their getaway attempt in a long night of violence.

A law enforcement intelligence bulletin obtained by the AP identified the surviving suspect as Dzhokhar A. Tsarnaev, 19, of Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Two law enforcement officials said Tsarnaev and the other suspect who was not immediately identified have been living legally in the US for at least one year. Russia's North Caucasus region has been plagued by an Islamic insurgency stemming from separatist wars in Chechnya.

Police are locking down some neighbourhoods in Boston and its western suburbs as they search for the remaining suspect known as the man in the white hat from marathon surveillance footage. Authorities urged residents in Watertown, Cambridge and other towns west of Boston, as well as the Allston-Brighton neighbourhoods of western Boston, to stay indoors.