A gunman shot and wounded four people at an education centre in central Sweden on Tuesday, police said, urging the public to stay away from the area as officers hunted for possible accomplices.Late Tuesday afternoon, a police cordon blocked off the area around Campus Risbergska, a secondary school for young adults in the town of Orebro, as AFP reporters saw some police cars and ambulances begin to leave the scene.School attacks are relatively rare in Sweden, but the country has suffered shootings and bombings linked to gang violence that kill dozens of people each year.Several media reported the suspected assailant had turned his gun on himself. Police would not confirm that but said five people were hurt by gunfire, including one who was thought to be the gunman.”One of the injured persons is a person whom we suspect may be the assailant,” Orebro police chief Roberto Eid Forest told a press conference.”We can’t rule out other suspects, and that’s something we are continuing to work on in this intensive phase now — why it happened and if there are other possible suspects.”He said police were not aware of a motive yet.- Hospital treats wounded -Forest said police received the first reports of a school shooting at 12:33 pm (1133 GMT), but could not specify how it unfolded nor whether it occurred inside or outside the school.Two Campus Risbergska teachers, Miriam Jarlevall and Patrik Soderman, told newspaper Dagens Nyheter they heard gunfire in a hallway.”Students came and said someone was shooting. Then we heard more shooting in the hallway. We didn’t go out, we hid in our offices,” they said.”There were a lot of gunshots at first and then it was quiet for a half-hour and then it started again. We were lying under our desks, cowering.”Some witnesses told Swedish media they heard what they believed to be automatic gunfire.Swedish television channel TV4 meanwhile reported that police had raided the suspect’s home in Orebro late on Tuesday afternoon.It said the suspect was around 35 years old and had a license to carry a weapon and no criminal record, but did not provide any details about his identity.Police have not confirmed that information.Orebro healthcare authorities said in a statement that four of the five with gunshot wounds had undergone surgery at Orebro University Hospital, and the fifth had only “slight injuries” and did not require surgery.A sixth person lightly wounded in the attack was also treated for non-gunshot injuries, its said, providing no other details.Police said they were investigating “attempted murder, arson and an aggravated weapons offence”.They urged members of the public to stay away from the area, or keep inside their homes.- Schools in lockdown -Students in several nearby schools as well as the one in question had been locked in for several hours “for safety reasons” before gradually being released, police said.”It is a very painful day for all of Sweden,” Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson wrote on X.”My thoughts are also with all those whose normal school day was replaced with horror. Being confined to a classroom fearing for your own life is a nightmare that no one should have to experience.”He said the government was “closely monitoring developments”.A mother whose son was kept indoors at his nearby school for several hours during the police operation told AFP she was “shocked” and “angry”.”My son is at this school behind us, they’re locked in too. They have to hide, so I’m waiting for them to evacuate,” Cia Sandell, 42, said. “This is crazy, totally crazy. I’m angry, I’m shocked. This shouldn’t happen,” she said.Though such shootings are rare, several other violent incidents have struck Swedish schools in recent years.In March 2022, an 18-year-old student stabbed two teachers to death at a secondary school in the southern city of Malmo.Two months earlier, a 16-year-old was arrested after wounding another student and a teacher with a knife at a school in the small town of Kristianstad.In October 2015, three people were killed in a racially-motivated attack at a school in the western town of Trollhattan by a sword-wielding assailant who was later killed by police.
Tue, 04 Feb 2025 17:04:39 GMT
