Self-identified communist activists have claimed responsibility for a bomb explosion at 9:00 a.m. Thursday which caused only minor damage at the four-star Morosani Posthotel in Davos, Switzerland, a few hundred yards from where company heads, central bankers, and politicians are meeting at the World Economic Forum.
Local Graubünden police spokesman Thomas Hobi confirmed that there had been a “little detonation” in the basement of the luxury hotel. The blast he said, shattered some glass windows but no injuries were reported.
Police were present at the hotel at the time of the explosion following a tip from the newspaper 20 Minuten, which had discovered a warning that there would be an attack there at 6:00 a.m. The warning was in the form of a posting on an activist website in which a group identifying itself as “Revolutionary Perspective” claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it had targeted the Posthotel because Swiss ministers and representatives of top bank UBS were staying there. Actually, contrary to earlier reports, members of the Swiss federal government were not staying at the hotel. “The security of the Federal Council was not questioned at any time,” Federal Council Chancellor Thomas Abhegglen told reporters.
The Morosani Posthotel bombing came days after the fatal suicide-bombing at Moscow’s Domodedovo Airport, in which at least 35 people were killed and more than 100 injured.
The explosion in Switzerland, the first sign of any trouble at this year’s World Economic Forum, failed to affect the main program, at which the attendees were addressed by former U.S. President Bill Clinton, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, and French President Nicholas Sarkozy.
