A student at Prague’s Charles University has killed 14 people and injured 25 others, 10 of them seriously, in what is believed to be the worst mass shooting in the Czech Republic’s modern history.
Authorities said that David Kozak, the gunman had conducted a premeditated violent attack, possibly inspired by similar massacres abroad and also influenced by a recent school shooting. The city’s police chief, Martin Vondrášek, told a press briefing that the death toll may rise further, adding that the shooter had been “eliminated” and the entire building was being evacuated.
The father of the shooter had been found dead earlier on Thursday, police said. Prague’s mayor, Bohuslav Svoboda, told Czech TV that the problem of the individual shooter is emerging here as well. Police responded to the shooting at Jan Palach Square, near tourist sites such as the 14th-century Charles Bridge in central Prague. Less than an hour later, they said the shooter had been “eliminated” and the entire building was being evacuated. Teachers and students were instructed by email to take shelter while the police action was under way.
European leaders sent their condolences, with the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, the Dutch prime minister, Mark Rutte, and Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, saying they were “deeply shocked by the heinous shooting at Charles University.”
