9 dead in shooting at school in Russia
Gunfire and explosions erupted at a school in central Russia on Tuesday, killing seven students and two school employees, according to witnesses and officials who blamed a teenager for the rare mass shooting in the country.
Within hours, President Vladimir Putin said he had ordered a tightening of Russia’s already restrictive laws on civilian gun ownership, a move that is likely to be implemented in the country’s top-down political system.
“The thing is that firearms, which are used as assault rifles and similar weapons in certain countries, are sometimes registered as hunting guns,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov. “The Russian National Guard will urgently consider the issue.”
In a scene of mayhem captured on cellphone videos, students jumped from windows and ran as shots rang out and the police and ambulances raced to the school in Kazan, a provincial capital about 450 miles east of Moscow.
Students and teachers in the school’s upper floors barricaded themselves in classrooms and waited for help, said Vyacheslav Yegoshin, 15, who witnessed the shooting from outside the building because he was late for school Tuesday.
A regional governor, Rustam Minnikhanov, said seven students, one teacher and an employee of the school whose job he did not specify had died and more than 20 people were wounded. The wounded ranged in age from 7 to 62. State media reported that two students had died from the fall after leaping from upperfloor windows.
Minnikhanov said a 19-year-old suspect was in custody.
Ria, a state news agency, published a video of a young man it said was the suspect, bound by his hands and feet to the bars of a cell while talking to an investigator. He appeared agitated and incoherent, saying he realized two months ago that “I hate everybody.” The video could not be independently confirmed.