TURGUTLU: A teenager opened fire outside a high school in western Turkiye on Tuesday, wounding 11 people before being detained by police, a minister said.
The incident happened at around 8am (0500 GMT) in Turgutlu in Manisa province, near the western resort city of Izmir, the regional governor’s office said.
Although such shootings are rare in Turkiye, there were two separate attacks by teenagers on consecutive days in April that shocked the nation, sparking deep concern about school security.
‘Eleven students were injured, two of them seriously... The minor who carried out the attack was quickly apprehended and takenintocustody,’Justice Minister Akin Gurlek wrote onX.
He said the suspect’s parents and grandfather had also been detained by investigators probing the attack, which saw police andrescuersrushingtothe scene alongside panicked parents.
Speaking to IHA news agency, one local resident said they saw the gunman moments after the shooting, saying he appeared to be angry.
‘Gunshots rang out. I immediately went out onto the balcony. He was swearing as he walked towards the side street. He was shouting,’ he said.
‘He fired at people here with the gun he was carrying. We could not intervene because he had a rifle,’ another eyewitness told IHA, which did not name either of them.
DHA news agency broadcast CCTV footage of the alleged attacker, a young man wearing black jeans and a jacket and a green top, holding what looked like a long-barrelled gun.
IHA had a similar image of the same person with a gun, although this time running. NTV private television said it was a shotgun.
Footage from outside the school showed police wrestling a man in a white shirt to the ground before leading him away, as a woman screamed, with onlookers filming with their mobile phones.
-AFP