The Lycée Français International in Reus opened late this Monday, after the international school's secretary received an email last night warning of the presence of explosives in the school. It was not the only school to experience such a situation. A number of other educational centres, also international schools, received the same bomb warnings, which are currently being analyzed, although it all seems to have been a hoax and the threats did not seem very realistic. Nevertheless, several checks were carried out and the Mossos d'Esquadra were deployed to the Lycée Français in Reus.
In total, according to several sources, almost twenty schools throughout Spain have been affected. Those whose names are known in Catalonia are, as well as the Lycée school in Reus, the Jigsaw British School in Catllar and the Socrates Educa International School, formerly EIC, in Salou, both like Reus, in the Tarragona area.
The same threat was also received in Pontevedra, Tenerife, Zaragoza, Vila-real and Castellón. The email had been sent to a number of school centres, claiming that an unknown person had left a package containing explosives that would blow up the school. However, the manner in which it was reported makes the police suspect that it is an unrealistic threat. In the mail sent last night, several centres were copied in to the email - a message, then, that seems to have been copied and propagated, but without any real threat.
What the schools had in common is that all offered international education, with the majority of them French. The centres brought the facts to the attention of the Spanish National Police and the French Embassy in Spain, which recommended suspending early morning classes in order to be able to carry out checks on Monday, December 18th. In Reus, after the initial checks, the centre was planning to continue with normal activity later in the day.
Search for the person responsible
A police investigation will thus begin, in order to uncover what is behind this bomb threat to international schools across Spain. For now, it is not known if the email contained any kind of political proclamation, nor if any group has claimed responsibility for the action.
It should be remembered that in recent months there have been false bomb alerts in a number of places in the Barcelona area. In the town of Sant Cugat, a man stated in a phone call that he had planted an explosive in the General Hospital, and was finally arrested. As well, at the Barcelona headquarters of the Vox political party, an anonymous call forced the evacuation of the building and the activation of the TEDAX explosives unit of the Mossos, who in the end assessed that there was no threat. Making this type of communication is a crime and can result in fines and prison terms.