Philippine student live-streamed fatal school shooting
Karen Lema and Mikhail Flores |
A student has live-streamed himself shooting and killing another student in a classroom in the southern Philippines before taking his own life, an official says, in the second school attack in the country in less than two months.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr ordered law enforcement agencies to investigate and to determine measures to be taken to prevent violence in schools.
“Our schools are where we entrust our children to learn, to grow and to dream about the lives ahead of them. They must also be among the safest places in our country,” Marcos said in a statement on Tuesday.
The shooting took place at a school attached to the privately run Ateneo de Zamboanga University in the city of Zamboanga, where the gunman brought a pistol and a rifle onto the school campus and fired at students inside the classroom, according to a preliminary police report.
Zamboanga Mayor Khymer Adan Olaso told DZBB radio that authorities confirmed the gunman live-streamed the attack through a body-worn camera.
Reuters verified a live-stream video of the shooter in the school.
The video shows him entering one classroom and opening fire. He then changed weapons, entered the second classroom and fired more rounds.
A student is seen lying on the ground in unclear condition.
The motive was not immediately clear, but a senior customs official told reporters that the shooter used a .40-caliber pistol issued by the Bureau of Customs to the student’s father, a customs official who has since been relieved from his post.
A second weapon recovered from the scene was a licensed personal firearm also owned by the shooter’s father, the official said.
Video aired by GMA News, with images blurred, showed chaotic scenes inside a classroom with students ducking for cover as several gunshots rang out.
The victim was a male grade 10 student, police said.
The gunman, a grade 9 student, killed himself, police said, with two others wounded.
The victim was found on the fourth floor of the school, while the gunman was later found dead on the fifth floor after taking his own life, city councillor Frederick Atilano said, citing police information.
The school is a five-storey building on an eight-hectare site that houses the university’s grade school and junior high school students, according to its website.
Several students were treated for injuries suffered during the panic to escape, but no other deaths were reported, he said, adding that classes have been suspended.
Social media footage verified by Reuters showed students from the school running out of the campus building while at least four gunshots were heard in the background.
The shooting followed an attack in June at a public high school in Tacloban City in the central Philippines in which at least three students were killed and about 20 others injured when two of their schoolmates opened fire on campus.
School shootings are rare in the Philippines, which has relatively strict gun ownership regulations, including background checks and psychological evaluation requirements, although illegal firearms remain in circulation.
The incident came less than 10 days after a high-profile incident in Thailand, where a student went on a shooting rampage at a school on the outskirts of the capital Bangkok.
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