Russian Extremist Group 'Male State' Denies Link to Europe-Wide Flight Bomb Hoaxes

The first email reached Rome's airport operators at 07:21 on Thursday. Its subject line warned of a threat. It was addressed to several offices and individuals at Aeroporti di Roma, the company that manages the city's airports, and to accounts at Fiumicino itself. By the end of the week, scores of flights across Europe had received bomb threats. No explosives have been found on any of them.

The message, seen by the BBC, was written in flawless Italian. It claimed that "fighters" of the "Male State" had planted explosives on two incoming flights, in an attack on Italy's "feminist regime" that would be "remembered forever." The sending address appears to be linked to the state health services in Bogota, Colombia. One of the two flights was ordered to land in France. The other was escorted into Rome by Italian air force jets, scrambled for the second time this week. Neither plane carried explosives.

A source at ADR told the BBC why the email was treated so seriously: warnings of this kind are extremely unusual, and the source could not recall anything similar in recent years.

The disruption spread on Friday. Reports emerged of new scares on a Ryanair flight from Rome to Lisbon and on a Wizz Air flight from Prague to Rome, which was diverted to Venice. Threats were also made to a number of high-profile Irish media organisations, prompting evacuations. The Irish government issued a statement suggesting a "co-ordinated campaign of disruption." It is not clear whether airports or airlines in other countries received the same or a similar message, and at least one Friday warning appears to have come by phone rather than email.

The group named in the Rome email has denied any part in it. Replying to the BBC Russian Service, a Telegram account linked to the so-called Male State and its founder, Vladislav Pozdnyakov, mocked the suggestion. "What Male State? Where have you seen it? It hasn't existed for many years," the message read. It added that if a threat letter were signed tomorrow by, say, Putin, the BBC would not try to reach the Russian president with the same "stupid question."

The group's own history complicates that denial. Russia banned it in 2021, and Pozdnyakov is now thought to live abroad. In some places it has renamed itself "Male Legion." One Telegram channel tied to him is mostly filled with virulently pro-Russian messaging about the war in Ukraine, along with posts highlighting problems and tensions in Europe, including recent youth protests. Bellingcat, which studied the group in 2022, called it then a "vocal and vile online booster" of the Russian invasion, with a clear far-right extremist ideology.

Italy's La Stampa has little doubt about who is responsible. It asked whether Male State is acting as "the regime's armed wing," and wrote that "attacking, and being able to deny the attacks" is part of the Russian game plan. The paper's view is an interpretation, not a finding by investigators.

Italy's defence minister, Guido Crosetto, framed the episode as part of something larger. He said he had spoken for years of a "hybrid threat" to Europe, and that day after day there are those with an interest in fuelling tensions, from incidents involving refrigerators to the blood supply in France and now these false alarms. His reference to refrigerators was to recent cyber attacks that raised supermarket fridge temperatures and destroyed mountains of produce. "Our interest is to do the opposite and ensure the country's security," he said.

Across Europe, the hunt continues for whoever sent the emails, and for an answer to whether the threats are being co-ordinated or are the work of copycats. No injuries have been reported.