At Charles University in Prague, a student shot 14 people and injured 25 others. The Interior Minister speaks of an “unimaginable tragedy.” Police are investigating a connection to another crime.
It was the penultimate day before the Christmas break – there was also a lot of activity at the famous Charles University in Prague, when shots were heard in the early afternoon in the Faculty of Philosophy building, in the middle of the historic city center on Jan Palach Square not far from Charles Bridge.
“My lecture ended at 2 p.m.,” says a student. “There were police officers with machine guns standing in front of the building. I told my fellow students that the police were there. At first everyone was calm, but then the news came that there had been a shooting.”
The police called on people to avoid the area and cordoned off the area. Residents should not go out of the house. Students ran out of the building with their arms raised. Others barricaded themselves in lecture halls and offices. Some climbed out of the window or onto the roof.
The shooter was on the roof
The shooter was also there most recently, reports the Czech TV station Nova. The director of the neighboring Rudolfinum art gallery, Petr Nedoma, observed something similar: “I saw a young man standing in the gallery of the Philosophical Faculty of Charles University. He was holding a weapon in his hand that looked like a submachine gun.”
He fired several times in the direction of the Mánes Bridge. “Then I saw him shoot again, put his hands up and throw the gun on the street,” said Nedoma.
The police find an arsenal of firearms
The attacker shot 14 people, the police said. 25 people were injured, ten of them seriously. Shortly before 4 p.m. the all-clear was given: the suspected shooter was dead. The security forces have no indication that he had accomplices. An arsenal of firearms and ammunition were found on site. It is said in Prague that the rapid deployment of the police was able to prevent something even worse from happening.
“At this point in time we are assuming that the attack was committed by a lone shooter,” said Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala. “So this is not an act of international terrorism or an organized group.”
Police link the shooter to another crime
Investigators believe the suspect first killed his father in the town of Hostoun, west of Prague – and then tried to kill himself. He was probably inspired by mass shootings abroad.
The 24-year-old man was an excellent student, said Police Chief Martin Vondrasek. He legally owned several weapons and acted very thoughtfully: “I would also like to say that we are working very seriously on the version that the attacker from Charles University is also responsible for the two victims at the end of last week in the Klánovice Forest .” A father and his baby died in a suburb of Prague.
The Czech government met at a special session and expressed its condolences to the victims and their relatives, including Interior Minister Vit Rakusan: “It is an unimaginable tragedy, it affects young people. It is something that the Czech Republic has never experienced before and that we “We all wish we had never experienced it. The pre-Christmas mood was changed beyond recognition by the actions of a madman.”
Marianne Allweiss, tagesschau, December 22nd, 2023 12:57 a.m