TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Shou Shan Zoo in Kaohsiung City and Fushan Botanical Garden in Yilan County closed for the day Thursday (May 18) after bomb threats.
Kaohsiung City’s tourism department said it had received an e-mail demanding NT$10 million (US$325), the Liberty Times reported. If no money was forthcoming, bombs would be detonated at Kaohsiung City Shou Shan Zoo and at the Dragon and Tiger Pagodas, a famous landmark in the city’s Zuoying District.
Police helped evacuate 750 visitors from the zoo and sealed off both locations. The zoo announced it would remain closed for the rest of the day, though a search of the premises failed to turn up any explosive devices.
While investigations into several recent bomb threats against train stations, national parks, and museums focused on a Chinese citizen who returned home after studies in Taiwan, the IP for Thursday’s bomb threat was in the United States, the report said. The extortionist left a cellphone number, which is being investigated.
Also Thursday morning, Fushan Botanical Garden in the Yilan County township of Yuanshan received an e-mail warning that six bombs would explode at 2 p.m. As police were searching the site, a new message arrived, saying that an attack on visitors would be broadcast live online Friday (May 19) morning.
The authorities decided to close the garden to the public for at least two days. In this case, the former student from China, named as Zhang (張), was suspected of posing as a Japanese attorney, the Liberty Times reported.