A teenager opened fire outside a high school in western Turkey on Tuesday, injuring 11 people before police detained the suspect, authorities said.
The shooting took place around 8am local time in Turgutlu, in Manisa province near the western city of Izmir, according to the provincial governor’s office.
Justice Minister Akin Gurlek said 11 students were wounded, including two who suffered serious injuries. He said police quickly arrested the teenage suspect.
Gurlek said investigators had also detained the suspect’s parents and grandfather as part of the inquiry into the attack.
Police and emergency teams were sent to the school as worried parents gathered at the scene. Local residents told Turkish media they heard gunshots and saw the attacker carrying a rifle.
Authorities have launched an investigation into how the weapon came into the teenager’s possession and how it had been stored and supervised. Investigators are also examining reports of possible bullying involving the suspect, Gurlek said.
CCTV footage
Turkish media broadcast CCTV images showing a young man wearing black trousers, a jacket and a green shirt while carrying what appeared to be a long-barrelled firearm.
Other footage showed police restraining a man outside the school before taking him away. Witnesses gathered near the school fence and recorded the incident on their phones.
The Education Ministry suspended classes at the school for the rest of the day.
The shooting has renewed concerns about security at Turkish schools following two attacks involving teenagers in April.
In one incident, a 14-year-old attacked a school in Kahramanmaras province, killing a teacher and nine students aged 10 and 11 before dying at the scene.
A day earlier, another teenager opened fire at his former high school in Sanliurfa province, injuring 16 people before killing himself when confronted by police.
Following those incidents, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan pledged tighter gun controls and said school security would be a government priority.
The latest attack came a day after Education Minister Yusuf Tekin and Interior Minister Mustafa Ciftci announced additional security measures for the new academic year.
Ciftci said more than 31,000 school grounds supervisors had been deployed, while police officers were assigned permanently to schools considered at higher risk. Lower-risk schools were given police liaison officers to coordinate with administrators.