Rome, 13 Nov. (LaPresse) – To address the enormous disruption caused by bomb threats in schools, we need “the clear-headedness, expertise and responsiveness that our security apparatus is already demonstrating at present”. So said the Minister of the Interior, Matteo Piantedosi, who, in an interview with Quotidiano Nazionale, added: “We are facing a strategy which, in Italy as in other European countries, aims to create alarm, disrupt citizens’ daily lives and discredit the institutions. This is precisely what we must prevent. Security remains our priority, but we must ensure that those spreading these threats do not succeed in imposing their agenda on the lives of millions of people. Already today (editor’s note: yesterday), following the initial guidance issued to prefects and headteachers in response to the alert sent to thousands of schools, only 77 schools were evacuated.” “Every report will continue to be assessed with the utmost care, based on concrete evidence and a qualified risk analysis,” added the Minister of the Interior. “But we must ensure that a generic threat circulated via email to thousands of addresses no longer makes evacuations necessary. These are measures that our security authorities have always taken, even before the recent incidents, to counter a myriad of false alarms whose sole purpose is to fuel fear. Today, however, the systematic use of such threatening tactics requires procedures that are even more widely agreed upon by all parties to ensure timely and proportionate responses.”
Bomb threats: Piantedosi says, “No more indiscriminate evacuations, but every threat will be investigated”
Rome, 13 Nov. (LaPresse) – To address the enormous disruption caused by bomb threats in schools, we need “the clear-headedness, expertise and responsiveness that our security apparatus is already demonstrating at present”. So said the Minister of the Interior, Matteo Piantedosi, who, in an interview with Quotidiano Nazionale, added: “We are facing a strategy which, in Italy as in other European countries, aims to create alarm, disrupt citizens’ daily lives and discredit the institutions. This is precisely what we must prevent. Security remains our priority, but we must ensure that those spreading these threats do not succeed in imposing their agenda on the lives of millions of people. Already today (editor’s note: yesterday), following the initial guidance issued to prefects and headteachers in response to the alert sent to thousands of schools, only 77 schools were evacuated.” “Every report will continue to be assessed with the utmost care, based on concrete evidence and a qualified risk analysis,” added the Minister of the Interior. “But we must ensure that a generic threat circulated via email to thousands of addresses no longer makes evacuations necessary. These are measures that our security authorities have always taken, even before the recent incidents, to counter a myriad of false alarms whose sole purpose is to fuel fear. Today, however, the systematic use of such threatening tactics requires procedures that are even more widely agreed upon by all parties to ensure timely and proportionate responses.”