Police detain Ukrainian for Czech and Slovak school bomb threats, Russian financing suspected

PRAGUE (Reuters) -A joint team of Ukrainian, Czech and Slovak police has detained a Ukrainian man suspected of sending bomb threats to schools in the Czech Republic and Slovakia starting in 2024, officials said on Wednesday, adding investigators believed the suspect's activities were likely financed by Russia.

"A special team yesterday detained a young man in Ukraine suspected of sending threatening emails to hundreds of schools in the Czech Republic last year," the Czech Security Information Service (BIS) said on X social media platform.

BIS said that according to initial information, the detained person attacked "a number of" other European states.

"The activities of the detainee were most likely financed by an actor from Russia," BIS said, without providing further details.

Western countries have increasingly been on alert for hybrid campaigns by Russia using disruption, sabotage or espionage - accusations that Moscow has denied.

The threatening emails disrupted the start of the school year for tens of thousands of children in the Czech Republic and Slovakia from September 2024.

Slovak police said on Facebook that Slovakia, Czech Republic, and Ukraine formed an investigation team in the case, and that security operations to detain the suspect took place in the early hours in the eastern Ukrainian city of Dnipro.

Home searches also took place, Slovak police said, adding it could not give further details.

(Reporting by Jason HovetEditing by Frances Kerry)