Six German courts evacuated after bomb threats

Police searched courtrooms in at least six cities across the country after receiving bomb threats and other security alerts, officials and media say.

A general view shows the court in Wiesbaden, Germany, January 11, 2019.
Reuters

A general view shows the court in Wiesbaden, Germany, January 11, 2019.

Police searched courtrooms in at least six cities across Germany after emailed bomb threats and other security alerts on Friday, officials and media said.

Police said they evacuated a court in the eastern city of Potsdam and another in the western city of Wiesbaden where a suspicious package was found.

Courts were also cleared in the central cities of Magdeburg and Erfurt and in the northern port of Kiel, the Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper reported.

Another court was briefly closed in Saarbruecken near the border with France after an emailed bomb threat, Bild newspaper reported.

Police searched the building then let it reopen, the paper said.

"Currently, we are deployed in the justice centre in Potsdam. There is a threat there of a bomb explosion today," police there said on Twitter. "Similarly worded threats were received in other cities."

A spokesman for the force covering Wiesbaden said it was too early to say if there was a link. "The investigation just began," said Johannes Neumann.

A spokeswoman for Germany's Federal Criminal Police said it knew of the bomb threats solely through media reports and was not currently involved in any investigation. 

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