Berlin - XINHUA
More than 20,000 people were evacuated on Sunday as the authorities successfully defused a 1.8-ton World War Two bomb in western Germany city of Dortmund.
About 1,200 personnel from the city's public sector helped organize the evacuation and temporary accommodation was provided in the city. It was not until late afternoon local time that the bomb was successfully defused.
The unexploded bomb was dropped by the Allied aircraft during a bombing campaign in the traditional industrial Ruhr region.
Sixty-eight years after the end of the WWII, thousands of unexploded bombs are still believed to be buried in Germany. A 250-kg WWII bomb in central Munichn was detonated in last August, causing damage to nearby buildings. In 2010, one unexpectedly exploded bomb killed three people in the central city of Goettingen.
In April this year, an undetonated 100 kg Soviet aerial bomb discovered in central Berlin was successfully defused by a bomb disposal team.