Luxembourg bomb threats from "Al Qaeda sympathiser"

(ADW) Police vehicles, heavily armed police officers, bomb disposal experts and sniffer dogs descended on Luxembourg City on Wednesday afternoon. For over two hours the capital was in a state of emergency with blocked roads in several areas.The focus at first was around the Place Guillaume II, but soon the search became wider moving towards the Gare area of the City.

The scare was caused by a bomb threat. At about 2:40pm, police reported they received a phone call from a man stating he had placed an explosive device near the Knuedler (Place Guillaume II), triggering the initial panic.

However the man phoned back later in the day stating he had placed explosive devices in other locations around the capital. The police described the man as “confused” but apparently proclaiming he was an Al-Qaeda sympathiser.

Shortly after receiving the initial call, the police sounded a general alarm. As several wort.lu readers reported within a short time, many police officers swooped down on Place Guillaume II, blocking it off completely to traffic and rerouting buses.

The police concentrated the search around the Sparkasse (BCEE) Savings Bank at one end of the Place. Sniffer dogs trained in explosives detection were also used.

With the second phone call, police shifted their attention to other locations, and then moved to the main train station and the general Gare area of the City, blocking off traffic. There were strong indications that the Sparkasse bank was being targeted once again, this time located on Avenue de la Gare.

By 4:30pm the police agreed that a full search of all areas had been exhausted and there was no longer any threat. It did however take some considerable time for road blocks to be lifted and traffic to flow normally once again.

Police have now announced that no explosives or bombs were found, and deemed the incident a false alarm.

Man arrested

During Wednesday's scare, a man watching events unfold from behind police blockades was arrested by police.

Whether this man was the phantom phone caller or indeed whether his arrest had anything to do with the bomb threat, despite speculation in some of Luxembourg's media, has not been made public by police at this stage.

Police seized the opportunity to advise the public that triggering a false alarm is a serious offence and can carry a prison sentence from 8 days up to 5 years.