On Thursday afternoon, there was a shooting in the center of Prague, at the Ján Palach tér building of the Faculty of Arts of Károly University. The attacker was a student at the university. According to the police, it is a pre-planned action. The Czech Republic declared a national day of mourning for Saturday.

The Czech Republic declared a national day of mourning for Saturday after an armed youth

He killed 14 people and injured 25 on Thursday afternoon at the Károly University in Prague.

Police officers on the balcony of Charles University in Prague following a shooting at the building on December 21, 2023. MTI/AP/Petr David Josek

Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said in a statement: “We are all shocked by this terrible act. It is difficult to find words for the pain and grief that our entire society feels in the days before Christmas”.

Fiala announced a national day of mourning for Saturday: flags will be lowered to half-mast on all public buildings, and a minute’s silence will be held at noon.

The motive for the shooting is still unclear. According to the BBC report, the police said that according to their as-yet unconfirmed information from social media, the attack may have been inspired by a similar incident in Russia. David K., a twenty-four-year-old university student suspected of the shooting, lived roughly twenty kilometers away, in a village of 1,200 inhabitants called Hostouň.

According to the police, the attacker was inspired by similar attacks in other countries

Martin Vondrášek, the head of the police, said that the body of the father of the perpetrator, a 24-year-old university student, was the first to be found in their home in the town of Hostoun, near Prague. They later found out that the student was going to have a class at the university, so that building was ordered to be evacuated.

However, according to the police, the perpetrator started shooting in a different building than the one that was evacuated. The police were notified at 14:59, and the commandos arrived at the scene in 12 minutes. At 15:20 they received the news that the perpetrator’s body was lying on a ledge of the building. The shooting student committed suicide, but the police also fired shots at him.

The police also announced that the gunman is also suspected of murdering a young man and his two-month-old daughter, who were found dead on December 15 in a forest on the outskirts of Prague.