The Hague:
Several members of a group of scientists that advises the Dutch government on managing the Covid-19 pandemic have received threats, regional media reported Friday.
Multiple specialists on the OMT scientific committee identified threatening letters had been left in their letterboxes at house, according to news internet site Nu.nl.
Committee member Andreas Voss told the web-site he had been referred to as a “horrible monkey” and told to “go back to Germany” in a note addressed to him.
Another OMT specialist, Diederik Gommers, mentioned that 1 of his colleagues was below police protection right after “serious threats”.
Other members of the committee told Nu.nl they had been so unsettled by the threats that they are now reluctant to speak to the media about Covid-19.
A spokesman for the RIVM public well being physique, exactly where the committee is primarily based, declined to comment when contacted by AFP.
Groups opposed to infection manage restrictions have demonstrated across the Netherlands considering that the starting of the coronavirus outbreak.
But no hyperlink has been established in between the protesters and the threats against the specialist committee, and none of the members has spoken about the probable supply of the threats.
In October, the Dutch anti-terrorism chief published a document warning of possible violence resulting from a “combination of extremist ideology, possible psycho-social and psychological problems and measures related to Covid-19”.
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