Montenegro mourns after 10 are killed in street attack

CETINJE, MONTENEGRO » Montenegro declared three days of national mourning Saturday, a day after 10 people, including two children, were killed in a daylight attack by a 34-year-old gunman who police said had recently exhibited a “change in behavior.”

The attacker used a hunting rifle to first shoot to death two children, 8 and 11, and their mother, who lived as tenants in his house in the western city of Cetinje’s Medovina neighborhood. He then walked to the street and randomly shot 13 more people, seven of them fatally. The gunman was shot dead later after a gunbattle with police.

Police investigating the rampage issued a statement Saturday saying it was still unclear what motivated the gunman — identified only by his initials, V.B. But they said people close to the attacker said he had recently started exhibiting a “change in behavior but nothing that indicated he could commit such a crime.” The attacker had an appointment to see a mental health care specialist but went on the rampage prior to it.

The police statement also said the law enforcement officers sent to the scene came under fire from the attacker and responded by firing at him at least 20 times and seriously injuring him.

“It is still being investigated if he died as the result of the serious injury (by police) or as the result of being shot at by a local citizen,” the statement said.

The prosecutor coordinating the investigation, Andrijana Nastic, told journalists Friday that the gunman was killed by a passerby and that a police officer was among the wounded. She said nine of those killed died at the scene and two died at a hospital.

Witnesses of the attack were struggling Saturday to come to terms with the carnage. They described scenes of chaos and horror as the gunman unleashed his fury on innocent people just going about their daily business on a warm summer afternoon.

“You could hear women crying, people shouting in panic that a man has a weapon and is indiscriminately shooting around. I heard gunshots,” said witness Milena Stanojevic. “I’ve seen a lot of crying, tears and sadness and today, silence and disbelief.”

Cetinje, a city of 17,000 people and the seat of Montenegro’s former royal government, is 22 miles west of Podogrica, the current capital of the small Balkan nation.

Four of the wounded were transferred to the Clinical Center in Podgorica for surgery and were still in intensive care Saturday, according to its chief neurosurgeon, Dr. Ivan Terzic. Two others suffered less severe injuries and were recovering at a hospital in Cetinje.

WARSAW, POLAND » Laboratory tests following a mass die-off of fish in the Oder River detected high levels of salinity but no mercury poisoning its waters, Poland’s environment minister said Saturday as the mystery continued as to what killed tons of fish in Central Europe.

Anna Moskwa, the minister of climate and environment, said analyses of river samples taken in both Poland and Germany revealed elevated salt levels. Comprehensive toxicology studies are still underway in Poland, she said.

She said Poland’s state veterinary authority tested seven species of the dead fish and ruled out mercury as the cause of the die-off but was still waiting for results of other substances. She said test results from Germany had also not shown a high presence of mercury.

The Oder River runs from Czechia to the border between Poland and Germany before flowing into the Baltic Sea. Some German media had suggested that the river have been be poisoned with mercury.

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said Friday that “huge amounts of chemical waste” were probably dumped intentionally into his country’s second-longest river, causing environmental damage so severe it would take years for the waterway to recover.

On Saturday, Morawiecki vowed to do everything possible to limit the environmental devastation. Poland’s interior minister said a reward of $220,000 would be paid to anyone who helps track down those responsible for polluting the river.

Authorities in the northeastern German state of Mecklenburg-western Pomerania warned people not to fish or use water from the Szczecin lagoon, as the river’s contaminated water was expected to reach the estuary area on Saturday evening.

“The extent of the fish die-off is shocking. This is a blow to the Oder as a waterway of great ecological value, from which it will presumably not recover for a long time,” said Alex Vogel, the environment minister for Germany’s Brandenburg state, along which the river runs.

The head of Polish waters, Poland’s national water management authority, said Thursday that 10 tons of dead fish had been removed from the river. Hundreds of volunteers were working to help collect dead fish along the German side.

German laboratories said they detected “atypical” levels of “salts” that could be linked to the die-off but wouldn’t fully explain them on their own.

Morawiecki acknowledged that some Polish officials were “sluggish” in reacting after huge numbers of dead fish were seen floating and washing ashore, and said two of them were dismissed.

“For me, however, the most important thing is to deal with this ecological disaster as soon as possible, because nature is our common heritage,” Morawiecki said.

His comments were echoed by Schwedt Mayor Annekathrin Hoppe, whose German town is located next to the Lower Oder Valley National Park. She called the contamination of the river “an environmental catastrophe of unprecedented scale” for the region.