Two men arrested for making bomb threats
(China Daily)
Updated: 2004-10-05 09:45

Two men in East China's Jiangxi Province have been detained by police for making bomb threats last week against six hotels, including three in Beijing, the Beijing News reported yesterday.

The two called three Beijing hotels on Thursday morning and threatened to blow them up if the management did not pay 100,000 yuan (US$12,000), according to the report.

Chen Mingwei, who works at the office building of the Holiday Inn Beijing Lido, one of the Beijing targets, said all guests and employees were evacuated on Thursday.

"They said there was a bomb in the hotel," Chen said. Only after several hours were people allowed back in.

After investigating, Beijing police discovered the phone calls had come from Shangrao in Jiangxi Province, the report said.

Detectives caught one of the two suspects, surnamed Pan, 33, on Friday night, who allegedly admitted to the crime after an interview and offered up the name of his accomplice, surnamed Zhang, 35.

Zhang was arrested early Saturday morning.

Pan also reportedly acknowledged the two made similar phones to three other hotels in East China's Anhui Province the same day.

Local police said the suspects did not have criminal records.

Bomb threats have been reported in large cities like Beijing. Beijing police in mid-September announced they had detained a man who allegedly made bomb threats to a bank downtown.

According to the Beijing Public Security Bureau, the man had called the police three times since May telling them bombs had been planted at the bank. However, police later found the bombs did not exist.

The man confessed to calling the bank's president and placing a bomb threat as well as sending him two threatening letters.

Police said the man is the former husband of an employee of the bank. He said he was unsatisfied with the bank's housing subsidies.

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