Are
YOUR children playing the Blue Whale challenge? Police warn British parents
over 'suicide game behind hundreds of Russian teen deaths'
·
British
PCs have urged parents to be aware of the Blue Whale challenge
·
The
online 'game' is being blamed for a spate of teenage suicides in Russia
·
Participants
allegedly complete self-harm 'tasks' before killing themselves
·
Two
schoolgirls fell to their deaths after taking part in Blue Whale suicide
game
Police Community Support
Officers in Cornwall and Devon have warned about the dangers of the 'Blue
Whale' challenge
British police are warning parents about the
dangers of a sick social media 'game' that's said to be responsible for
hundreds of teenage suicides in Russia.
The 'Blue Whale challenge' encourages at-risk
participants to take part in a series of tasks like cutting themselves every
day for 50 days.
They are then instructed to kill themselves on the final
day of the sick 'challenge'.
The social media 'game' is being investigated
by police in Russia in relation to a rash of teenage suicide
attempts.
Now police officers in Britain are posting online
warnings to alert parents about the challenge.
Devon and Cornwall Police PCSO Kirsty Down posted on
Twitter: 'Who ever created this horrible game is sick! Parents: Please be aware
of this 'game' talk to your children about it if concerned.'
The panic over the online challenge was prompted by the
death of two teenagers in Russia last month who were believed to be
participating.
The deaths of Yulia Konstantinova, 15, pictured right and Veronika, 16,
pictured left, were also connected to the challenge
Game masters are telling girls to carve words or symbols into their
bodies for the game called Blue Whale, depicted here with a bloody cut in a
teenager's forearm
Game masters are telling girls to carve words or symbols into their
bodies for the game called Blue Whale, depicted here with a bloody cut in a
teenager's forearm
Two school girls Yulia Konstantinova, 15, and
Veronika Volkova, 16, fell to their deaths from the roof of an apartment block
in industrial Ust-Ilimsk.
A girl named only as Ekaterina, 15, was critically
injured after she fell onto snowy ground from a flat in the city of
Krasnoyarsk, also Siberia.
Just two days beforehand a 14-year-old girl from Chita,
near Mongolia, was reported to have thrown herself under a commuter train.
In all cases state investigators are probing
whether a controversial web 'suicide game' has influenced the girls to seek to
take their lives.
Yulia left a note saying 'End' on her social page and
earlier she had posted a picture with big blue whale, seen as a symbol of a
social media movement encouraging children to take their own lives.
Her friend Veronika wrote: 'Sense is lost... End.'
She regularly posted sad messages such as, 'Do you feel
that gradually you become useless?' or 'I'm just a ghost'.
It was reported that two teenage boys were detained by
police at the scene after allegedly filming the tragic double suicide.
Schoolgirl Yulia Konstantinova, 15, who died after falling from an
apartment block in industrial Ust-Ilimsk.
The Russian Investigative Committee has
opened a probe on 'incitement to suicide' regarding the pair's death.
'Investigators checked the scene, the homes of the
minors, and interviewed relatives and friends of the victims, to establish the
motives,' said a statement.
'Particular attention during the investigation of the
criminal case will be given to the study of their social contacts on the
Internet.'
In Krasnoyarsk, law enforcement recently opened three
criminal cases of incitement to suicide involving schoolgirls via the groups in
social media.
In all these cases, the teenagers were rescued.
One local school director told police he had
received an anonymous call saying a student had joined a 'group of death' and
planned soon to kill herself.
The police identified the girl who explained that had had
joined a 'game' in social media network 'Vkontakte', and had been given 'tasks'
by the administrator of the group.
She was told to cut certain words on her hands and search
for a high-rise building from which she could jump.
She did not obey the commands - but there are fears that
others did.
In the Chita case, transport police confirmed
that the so-called suicide game 'Blue Whale' is seen as a possible 'cause of
death'.
A second girl had made plans to kill herself with the
dead teenager, but changed her mind at the last moment.
Teenagers are urged to use a knife or razor to make the
shape of a whale on their wrist or leg, say Russian reports.
They are also urged to watch horror movies all day, and
to wake themselves at 4.20am, steps leading up to demands to take their own
lives on the 50th day of being in the game.
There was deep concern last year when there were fears
that the sinister masterminds could be behind at least 130 suicides across
Russia.
After the arrest of a supposed ringleader, there was a
reduction in cases, but now there is major new fear of vulnerable teenagers
being swayed by the barbaric death social media accounts.
Investigative newspaper Novaya Gazeta
reported last year: 'We have counted 130 suicides of children that took place
between November 2015 to April 2016.
'Almost all these children were members of the same
internet groups and lived in good, happy families.'
It went on: 'We know absolutely for sure is that adults
are working with children, with the help of knowledge of their habits and
passions, using their favourite language and culture,' reported the newspaper.
'They know psychology well, they convince girls that they
are 'fat', tell boys that they are 'losers' in this world. And that there is
another world and they will be among the chosen.'
A report on Ren TV said that an internal report by the
FSB secret service, once headed by Vladimir Putin, 'indicated that the problem
of provoking suicides among underage children via Internet is really serious'.
Last year an alleged ringleader named as 21-year-old Philip Budeikin was detained, and he has been charged with organising eight groups between 2013 and 2016 which 'promote suicide'.
Some 15 teenagers committed suicide, and another five
were rescued at the last moment, according to the case against him.
Children are told on such social media that 'the best
things in life start with the letter 'S' - semiya (family), Saturday, sex,
suicide.'
The children are asked: 'How many dull days like this are
you going to drag yourself through?'
A picture of an approaching train has a sign: 'This world
is not for us.'
A photograph of teens on a roof is captioned: 'We are
children of the dead generation.'
However there are also some doubts about the extent to
which the Blue Whale phenomenon was responsible for the rash of teenage
suicides in Russia.
Fact-checking
website Snopes reported that it was 'Unproven' that the suicide game was
solely responsible for the deaths.
I Reminde You it will cost You
Blue Whale effect on kerala (Trivandrum)
I Reminde You it will cost You
Blue Whale effect on kerala (Trivandrum)
