Schools in Montenegro Evacuated Over False Bomb Alarm

Elementary school in Montenegrin capital Podgorica after the evacuation. Photo: BIRN/Samir Kajosevic

Interior Ministry official Zoran Miljanic said three schools in the capital, Podgorica, and one in the town of Bijelo Polje were evacuated, calling on citizens not to panic.

"Montenegrin police, the Interior Ministry and the prosecutor's office are doing everything necessary to find the perpetrator. Their goal is to alarm the public and spread panic," Miljanic told the daily Vijesti.

"We believe the same person or organization is behind today's emails and the case of a bomb report in Budva, from Sunday", he added.

On Friday, media reported that an email signed by Vladislav Pozdnyakov, the founder of a Russian ultra-nationalist online group, "Male State", had been sent to the government, Interior Ministry and Podgorica city hall, demanding a change of government and in the National Security Agency, AMB, or "all schools will be blown away".

While police evacuated the "Marko Miljanov" school in the northern town of Bijelo Polje, the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sport said that school principals had taken all necessary measures and children were safe.

One of the leaders of the pro-Serbian Democratic Front, Milan Knezevic, accused authorities of reacting poorly to security threats in the country.

"The general disarray and silence in the security sector oblige me to urgently schedule a session of the parliament's Defence and Security Committee. Whoever is behind these false bomb alarms must be arrested," Knezevic posted on Twitter.

On March 27, police evacuated a shopping mall in the coastal town of Budva after a false bomb alarm, and on March 29, a block in Podgorica was evacuated after a false...