Austria disco attack claimed

The grenade was thrown onto the dance floor

A previously unknown group has said it carried out last weekend's attack on an Austrian disco in the city of Linz, police say.

The claim - from a group calling itself the "Bosnian Cobras" - was in an e-mail sent to the daily newspaper Kronen Zeitung.

The e-mail also included death threats against two of those wounded in the attack.

Twenty-seven people were injured early on Saturday when an attacker rolled a hand grenade onto the crowded dance floor of a club popular with teenage Balkan immigrants.

A transcript of the e-mail published on the website of Kronen Zeitung on Wednesday said the attack had been intended to target "Yugoslavs and Croats".

Police protection

"At the moment we cannot ascertain how serious this letter is," a police spokesman in Linz said.

"But it specifically threatens two victims of the attack with death."

Officials did not release the identity of the two. They have been placed under police protection.

But the police spokesman said the names and photographs of the victims had appeared widely in the Austrian media after the attack.

The e-mail was sent from a public-access computer, the spokesman added.

Linz is one of many Austrian cities that has immigrant communities from the Balkans.