A shooter killed at least eight people and wounded 13 in a drive-by attack near a town close to Belgrade late Thursday, the second such mass killing in Serbia in two days, state television reported.
The attacker shot randomly at people near the town of Mladenovac, some 50 kilometers (30 miles) south of the capital, the RTS report said early Friday. Police were looking for a 21-year-old suspect who fled after the attack, the report said.
The shooting came a day after a 13-year-old boy used his father’s guns in a rampage at a school in Belgrade that killed eight of his fellow students and a school guard.
The bloodshed sent shockwaves through a Balkan nation unused to mass murders.
Though Serbia is awash with weapons left over from the wars of the 1990s, mass shootings are extremely rare. Wednesday’s school shooting was the first in the country’s modern history. The last mass shooting before this week was in 2013, when a war veteran killed 13 people in a central Serbian village.
Serbian Interior Minister Bratislav Gasic called Thursday’s shooting “a terrorist act,” state media reported.
Special police and helicopter units have been sent to the region as well as ambulances, it added.
Earlier Thursday, Serbian students, many wearing black and carrying flowers, filled streets around the school in central Belgrade as they paid silent homage to peers killed a day earlier. Thousands lined up to lay flowers, light candles and leave toys to commemorate the nine people who were killed on Wednesday morning.
The tragedy also sparked a debate about the general state of the nation following decades of crises and conflicts whose aftermath have created a state of permanent insecurity and instability, along with deep political divisions.
Authorities on Thursday moved to boost gun control, as police urged citizens to lock up their guns and keep them away from children.
Police have said that the teen used his father’s guns to carry out the attack. He had planned it for a month, drawing sketches of classrooms and making lists of the children he planned to kill, police said on Wednesday.
(AP)