At least 11 pupils have been injured after a teenager suddenly opened fire outside a vocational school in Turkey’s Manisa province.
The frightening incident happened outside Inci Uzmez High School on Tuesday (September 22) morning, just as classes were about to begin. Two of the injured pupils are in a critical condition.
The teenager fled immediately after the attack. Police later detained a 15-year-old pupil of the same school after reviewing CCTV footage. The footage showed him walking along the road in a relaxed manner with a large shotgun in his hand, before firing and running away.
The country’s justice minister, Akin Gurlek, said the weapon used in the shooting belonged to the boy’s grandfather. His father, mother and grandfather have therefore been taken into police custody alongside him, in order to establish what lay behind the incident. He will be formally arrested in accordance with court procedure. Exactly why he did this is not yet clear.
Expressing deep sorrow at the incident, the country’s education ministry has sent a three-member investigation team to examine the whole matter.
This is the third school shooting in Turkey this year. In April, nine schoolchildren and a teacher were killed when a 14-year-old opened fire at a school in the city of Kahramanmaras. One violent incident after another has caused an outcry across the country. Although the government has taken various steps on weapons control and increasing security at schools, bloodshed of this kind is not being stopped.