Climate activists have infuriated police and firefighters in Germany with a new tactic of making bogus alarm calls to the emergency services.

Officials in Essen, North Rhine Westphalia, say they have been plagued with a series of emergency calls that turned out to be sick hoaxes on Tuesday, 20th December.

The activists are using a local emergency app ‘Nora’ to call for help on everything from gas leaks to seriously injured people by the side of the road.

Another hoax summoned police to the scene of a fake armed robbery.

Angry police say the hoaxes mean that the emergency services are being prevented from attending real life-or-death callouts.

Astonishingly, the eco-protesters even boast about their latest switch in tactics.

In a post admitting the stunt, they wrote: “You thought it was an emergency, but the real emergency – the impending climate catastrophe – which will kill millions of people, is being consistently ignored by our politicians.

“We will continue this form of protest until our federal government enacts effective legislation to prevent climate catastrophe.”

An investigation has linked the hoax calls to a group operating in southern Germany with links to environmental activism.

The investigation is continuing and police have warned that the hoax calls are a criminal offence.

Fire department spokesman Christoph Risse said: “We condemn that in the strongest possible terms.

“Once we get an alert like this, we have to attend.

“It was purely chance that no other emergency happened at the same time. And until we can verify that the call we were on was a hoax, we would not be able to turn around.”