At least eight people have been killed in a shooting incident that took place at an elementary school near Sao Paulo in Brazil, state military police said.
The incident took place in the early hours of Wednesday after two young men were seen entering the building and firing weapons before committing suicide, police said.
Police said that two adolescents, wearing face masks, entered the building and started shooting at about 9:30am local time (06:30 GMT).
“Eight people died at the scene, including the two assailants who committed suicide,” said a state military police spokesman.
“Two injured people died after being taken to hospital.”
Around 15 people were injured in the shooting at the Raul Brasil public school in Suzano, south-east Brazil.
Sao Paulo state Governor Joao Doria said four children and two members of staff were among the dead.
Even though Brazil is one of the world’s most violent countries, school shootings are rare.
The last major school shooting was in 2011, when 12 children were shot dead by a former pupil in Rio de Janeiro.
While gun laws are extremely strict in Brazil, it is not difficult to buy a weapon illegally.
Brazil’s new President Jair Bolsonaro recently announced that gun ownership controls would be relaxed.
However, the president is also trying to lower the age in which children can be detained.
“Today the Supreme Court in Brazil is debating a measure that [Bolsonaro] put forward to try to lower the age in which children can be detained by the police [or] can be questioned,” said Al Jazeera’s Daniel Schweimler.
“We don’t know yet the ages of the two attackers [of today shooting] but some assume they may well have been former pupils [of the school], or of a similar age than the children, that is still being investigated,” he added.
Worried families
About 1,000 children attend the school, police said.
Television pictures showed worried family members congregating outside the school in the greater Sao Paulo area, alongside firefighters and security services.
Earlier on Wednesday, another shooting took place about 500 metres from the school but it was not yet clear if the two incidents were related.
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Worried family members congregasted outside the school after the shooting [Mauricio Sumiya/AP Photo] |
SOURCE:
Al Jazeera and news agencies
