ANOTHER FALSE BOMB ALERT IN YEREVAN
By Karine Kalantarian
Radio Liberty, Czech Rep.
Aug 30 2007
Dozens of teachers and other staff were briefly evacuated from a
school building in central Yerevan on Thursday after what turned out
to be a false bomb alert.
An assistant to the school principal said she received a phone call
from an unknown man in the morning shortly before a planned staff
meeting that was due to discuss preparations for the start of a new
academic year.
"He said an explosive device was planted in the school and said we
should evacuate all people," she said. "When I asked who I am talking
to, he hung up."
Security forces, joined by rescue workers and ambulances, arrived at
the secondary school No. 26 and ordered its personnel to leave the
building shortly after being informed about the call. They searched
the building and found no explosives there.
School officials said no students were inside the building on Thursday
morning. The new academic year in Armenia starts on September 1.
"This is the third such incident in the history of our schools," said
Onik Vatian, head of the Yerevan municipality’s education department.
"I find it unacceptable."
The incident occurred less than two months after a similar phone call
forced the evacuation of employees of several government ministries
located in a single building. Police arrested on the same day an
elderly man who allegedly made the false alert. He was said to have
a history of mental illness.