By JARI TANNER (Associated Press)
In southern Finland, a 12-year-old student shot and killed one person and seriously injured two other students at a secondary school on Tuesday morning, as reported by the police. The suspect was later captured.
The Viertola school, a large educational institution with approximately 800 students in total, was cordoned off by heavily armed police in Vantaa, just outside Helsinki, after a shooting incident was reported at 09:08 a.m.
Both the suspect and the victims were 12 years old, according to the police.
During a news conference, Chief of Police Ilkka Koskimäki from the Eastern Uusimaa Police Department stated that one student died immediately after being shot, and the other two were seriously wounded.
The suspect used a registered handgun that belonged to a relative, stated Detective Inspector Kimmo Hyvärinen.
The suspect was apprehended in the Helsinki area less than an hour after the shooting while in possession of a handgun, according to police. He confessed to the shooting in an initial police hearing, but the motive is not yet known. The case is being investigated as a murder and two attempted murders.
Finnish President Alexander Stubb and Prime Minister Petteri Orpo expressed condolences to the victims' families in postings on X, both expressing shock over the shooting.
“The age of the victim and the suspect make it especially shocking,” said Orpo during a later news conference on Tuesday. “I can assure you that this (shooting) will be carefully reviewed, and steps will be taken to ensure it does not happen again.”
In Finland, the minimum age of criminal liability is 15 years, which means the suspect cannot be officially arrested. A suspect younger than 15 can only be questioned by the police and then handed over to Finland’s child welfare authorities.
Over the past decades, Finland has experienced two major deadly school shootings.
In November 2007, an 18-year-old student armed with a semi-automatic pistol opened fire at the Jokela high school in Tuusula, southern Finland, killing nine people. He was found dead with self-inflicted wounds.
Less than a year later, in September 2008, a 22-year-old student shot and killed 10 people with a semi-automatic pistol at a vocational college in Kauhajoki, southwestern Finland, before fatally shooting himself.
In the Nordic nation of 5.6 million, there are more than 1.5 million licensed firearms and about 430,000 license holders, according to the Finnish Interior Ministry. Hunting and gun-ownership have long traditions in the sparsely-populated northern European country.
Local police departments are responsible for issuing permits for regular firearms.
After the school shootings in 2007 and 2008, Finland strengthened its gun laws by increasing the minimum age for firearms ownership and giving the police more authority to conduct background checks on individuals applying for a gun license.
The Interior Ministry announced that Finland will honor the victims of the school shooting on Wednesday by having all state agencies and institutions lower the national flag to half staff. Private households are also encouraged to take part in the remembrance, as stated by the ministry.
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