Police search S.Korean airport after online bomb threat

Seoul, Aug 7 (IANS) An online post threatening to bomb the airport in South Korea's resort island of Jeju has triggered police searches at the premises and a hunt to track down the suspect, officials said Monday.

The post was uploaded on an internet community at 9.07 p.m. Sunday, threatening to "launch a terrorist bombing attack on Jeju International Airport at 2 p.m. on Monday", Yonhap News Agency quoted police officials as saying.

The writer said a bomb had already been planted at the airport and threatened to stab people coming out of the building.

After spotting the post, the police conducted a search of Jeju International Airport for two hours, but no explosives were found.

The officials said the police plan to deploy police personnel and step up access controls at the airport on Monday to prepare for any emergency situation.

The police on Monday also searched Gimhae International Airport in the southeastern port city of Busan and Daegu International Airport in the southeastern city of Daegu after online bomb threats were made for both airports.

An online post, uploaded at 12.18 a.m. on Monday, threatened to detonate a bomb and kill everyone with a jackknife at Gimhae International Airport.

Another post on an internet community, uploaded at 11.16 p.m. on Sunday, warned of "a terrorist bombing attack at Daegu International Airport on August 9," threatening to "stab everyone to death".

Shortly thereafter, the police searched the two airports but found no signs of terrorism, the officials said, adding they will step up security at the airports.

The incidents mark the latest in a series of copycat crime threats that followed two fatal stabbing rampages in and around Seoul.

On August 3, a 22-year-old suspect, surnamed Choi, rammed a vehicle into pedestrians outside of a department store in Bundang, south of Seoul, and then attacked shoppers with a knife inside the store, leaving 14 people wounded, 12 of them seriously.

One of the victims, a woman in her 60s, was pronounced dead after three days of treatment.

On July 21, a 33-year-old man named Cho Seon fatally stabbed a stranger in his 20s near Sillim Station in Seoul and then attacked three other men in a nearby alleyway.

Police said on Sunday they have tracked down 54 people in connection with online murder threats across the country amid concerns of copycat crimes.