Fresh threats as Italy says no need to evacuate schools

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The government said there was no need to evacuate buildings over the mass e-mails. Read more at straitstimes.com.

Police officers outside a primary school in Rome after it was evacuated following a bomb alert that prompted evacuations in at least 300 schools across Italy on Nov 11.

ROME – Several schools were evacuated in Italy for a second day on Nov 12 over e-mailed hoax bomb threats as the government sought to reassure the public after scenes of panic and chaos.

The government said there was no need to evacuate buildings over the mass e-mails after hundreds of schools were evacuated across Italy on Nov 11.

A threat supposedly from a Taiwanese account was e-mailed to thousands of schools – almost Italy’s entire state school network – on Nov 11.

Some more schools were reportedly evacuated on Nov 12 following some 1,800 e-mailed bomb threats – this time from accounts in the Philippines, according to local media.

French President Emmanuel Macron said it was too soon to say if “foreign powers” were behind the recent rash of hoax bomb threats across Europe, including against flights and schools.

“As I speak, we do not have sufficient elements to be able to make an attribution,” Macron told reporters at a gathering of European leaders in Dublin, adding: “We cannot say if foreign powers are behind these calls.”

The threats on Nov 11 and 12 were purportedly signed off by a “Mikhail Andropov”.

After talks with intelligence and security chiefs on Nov 11, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said the messages were intended to “instil fear” and said that police checks had “found nothing in any schools”.

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