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Swedish passenger causes Copenhagen Airport evacuation with bomb joke

Police were forced to evacuate Terminal 2 at Copenhagen Airport on Friday morning after a Swedish national handball trainer joked to security personnel that he had a bomb in his suitcase.

Swedish passenger causes Copenhagen Airport evacuation with bomb joke
Terminal 2 at Copenhagen Airport. Photo: Claus Bech/Ritzau Scanpix/TT

“We’d like to emphasise that you should not joke about this kind of thing, as we have to act on it,” Copenhagen police wrote on Twitter.

“The owner of the bag has been arrested and charged for making a threat,” police said.

Police evacuated Terminal 2 at Copenhagen Airport after a man joked to staff at security that he had a bomb in his luggage, Danish TV2 reports.

The terminal was closed for around an hour while police inspected the man’s luggage, resulting in long queues once it was reopened.

According to Sydsvenskan newspaper, the man in question is a Swedish 29-year-old handball trainer for one of Sweden’s national teams.

Robert Wedberg, spokesperson for the national team, told the newspaper that the 29-year-old has been suspended.

“He’s been dismissed, or removed from all his assignments,” he said. “It’s a police matter.”

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Denmark confirms latest extension of Germany border controls

Denmark’s temporary controls on the border with Germany have again been extended for a new six-month term.

Denmark confirms latest extension of Germany border controls

The latest extension to the border controls was confirmed by Danish Justice Minister Peter Hummelgaard in a ministry press statement on Friday.

The existing borders controls would have expired in May had they not been extended.

“The safety and security of Danes is a core priority for the government. It is the view of the government that the current level of threat makes it necessary to retain the temporary border controls with Germany,” Hummelgaard said in the statement.

Although technically a temporary measure, the Danish border controls have been extended many times and have been in place in some form since 2016.

Although Denmark’s border controls have been continually extended, they were relaxed in May last year.

The relaxed rules mean that fewer motorists are now stopped for checks at the border when entering Denmark from Germany, compared to early 2023 and before. Instead, border controls are made in line with police assessments on where they are most needed.

Denmark’s repeated decisions to extend the controls have however raised concerns in the EU, which has initiated a review of whether the measure is legal.

Under the rules of the Schengen agreement, countries can place temporary border controls under exceptional circumstances. After a six-month period, the temporary checks must be renewed. 

Denmark initially introduced border checks with Germany in early 2016, citing the refugee crisis of late 2015 as justification. It later referred to a more general “security and migration situation” as cause for continually extending the controls, pointing to what it said was a threat of organised crime and terrorism.

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