Uruguayan authorities have dealt with at least six bomb threats over the past week, with university buildings and shopping centers having been evacuated.
The bomb threats began on Saturday, March 22, when Montevideo Shopping Center had to be evacuated after a bomb threat was made in a telephone call. Authorities evacuated the mall, but no explosives were discovered.
The next day, the Punta Carretas shopping center—also in Montevideo—received a similar threat. The same day, Montevideo Shopping received its second threat in 24 hours. Both malls had to be evacuated. Once again, no explosives were found, and the shopping centers were able to reopen.
The three fake threats were found to have been made from the same telephone number.
Monday passed without incident, however Montevideo-based shopping center Portones Shopping received a bomb threat on Tuesday, March 25. The same day, the University of the Republic (UDELAR) had to evacuate the annex building of its medicine faculty due to a bomb threat. Both locations were found to be free of any explosives.
The threats continued into Wednesday, when UDELAR received an email from an alleged “Marcos Berber” which read, “Hello, I belong to an online group called 764. I am telling you that I will go to one of the UDELAR faculties first thing tomorrow morning to commit a massacre. I will be armed with firearms and knives. I will try to kill as many people as possible and then commit suicide.”
The author of the email also claimed that they would broadcast the “massacre” live on TikTok, adding: “You caused me pain, now I will make you hurt more. I will show all of you that no life matters.”
Attached to the email was an image of firearms, with bullets arranged in the shape of the numbers “764”. Also copied into the email were major political parties the Broad Front and National Party.
According to the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, 764 is a “network of online groups that engage in sextortion and the glorification of violence” that is known to “[force] minor victims to produce Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM)” which is used to “force victims to perform acts of violence, animal abuse, or self-harm.” The group also uses intimidation techniques to “silence their victims,” with at least ten members having been arrested since 2021 for sextortion, possession of CSAM, or violent attacks.
The different UDELAR faculties took different approaches to the threat. Some faculties closed for the entirety of Wednesday, while other departments shut their doors for the morning before reopening in the afternoon. The faculty of medicine was the only department to remain open throughout the day, though only “closed-door activities” could take place.
Several secondary schools reportedly received a similar threat to that of UDELAR on Wednesday. The San Carlos secondary school in the department of Maldonado was sent an email from a seemingly male sender who threatened to go to the school to “kill as many people as he could” because he was “fed up with bullying.” The school cancelled its Thursday morning classes.
The country’s director of National Police, José Manuel Azambuya, said in a press conference on Wednesday, March 26, “The National Police, in all units under its jurisdiction, has been working, monitoring, investigating, preventing, observing, and informing the Prosecutor’s Office with the information we have been gathering. We ask the public to understand that the police are concerned and committed to the investigation.”
Azambuya added, “All hypotheses are being considered and the Police are on full alert”.
Featured image credit:
Image: Medicine Faculty of UDELAR
Photographer: Marcos Mendizábal
Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Facultad_de_Medicina,_Montevideo_25.jpg
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en
