'Islamist' bomb threat to Northern Ireland schools: Fear swept across province today

Police issued a statement just before 10am confirming they were making urgent enquiries.

Parents across the Province expressed fear and confusion on social media as some rushed to collect their children.

One Coleraine mum wrote on social media that it was “very frightening to get the message from school this morning” but added: “Thankfully the school acted so quickly”.

The principal of St Colman’s Primary School in Lambeg, Stephen Baine, said it was “very worrying” in light of the school having 400 children and 80 staff.

On police advice the school went into emergency response mode and treated the threat as a worst-case scenario. “Our school responded immediately with an evacuation,” he told Press Association.

"The children were brought out of the classroom safely onto the back of the school site. Parents were informed and came within 30 to 40 minutes and collected the children, and removed the children from the school site to allow safety measurements to be put in place.”

However while some schools across the Province closed, the majority of them remained open.

By late morning Education Minister Paul Givan held a brief press statement at Stormont giving details on what he said was an "Islamist" bomb threat in the email.

Parents had to wait until shortly before noon before the PSNI officially announced that it was a hoax - which originated outside the UK – and affected 300 schools.

Police Scotland told the News Letter they had 300 phone calls today about a similar hoax.

Last week many schools across the Republic of Ireland received a similar email.

About mid-morning Education Minister Paul Givan held a press conference in which he said the warning, was signed off “Allahu Akbar”.

Speaking to reporters at Stormont, Mr Givan confirmed that 160 schools had been subject to the communications.

“This morning 160 schools received a threat reporting – it would appear to me from Islamists threatening that Sharia law will be brought into our country and that there is viable devices within those school settings and it was signed off ‘Allahu Akbar’,” he told Press Association.

He added: “At this stage the advice to schools is that we’re not treating this as a viable threat but it has clearly caused huge alarm."

Some schools closed but unless they found "a specifically identified object in their school" they had no need to do so, he added.

Shortly before noon police issued an update, saying they were treating the matter as a hoax.

Assistant Chief Constable Ryan Henderson said: "We take incidents of this nature very seriously and we understand the concern in the community, not to mention the disruption it has caused in some school communities and for students and parents.

"Our enquiries are ongoing, however, at this stage we consider risk to the public as low. We will continue to liaise with schools impacted and have been working closely with the Department of Education and the Education Authority this morning to provide reassurance."

However around 1:30pm the trade union representing head teachers issued a public statement complaining that its members had been getting 'conflicting advice' on how to handle the threats.

Rob Kelsall, assistant general secretary of school leaders’ union NAHT praised school leaders and staff for responding with professionalism.

"However, it is unacceptable that some have been left trying to reconcile differing and, at times, contradictory advice from multiple agencies while managing incidents of this seriousness," he said.

NAHT Belfast has raised concerns with the minister and called for a "joined-up review" of how such information is communicated. The Education Authority responded that it worked closely with police throughout the incident and released updates as soon as they became available.