After the second mass shooting in Serbia in two days, a suspect was apprehended.
May 5, 2023Tweet
A man suspected of killing at least eight people in Serbia has been arrested following a massive manhunt, leaving the country reeling from its second mass shooting in just two days. The latest shooting happened late on Thursday night when an attacker opened fire in the village of Dubona, about 37 miles southeast of the Serbian capital Belgrade. More than 600 members of Serbian Special Forces were deployed to search for the suspect, and all special police units were engaged. The suspect, identified by authorities as a 21-year-old male named Uros B, was arrested on Friday morning. The Interior Ministry confirmed to CNN that they are treating this incident as an act of domestic terrorism, but did not specify more details.
A police officer and his sister were among those killed, according to local media. Milos Stanisavljevi, a local resident, left his house in Sepsin during the night to see what was happening outside, and the police mistook him for the shooter and arrested him. On Wednesday, Serbia was rocked by news of a 13-year-old boy opening fire on classmates at a school in the capital Belgrade, killing at least eight children and a security guard. Serbia's president Aleksander Vucic expressed his condolences to the victims and pledged to make urgent changes in weapon legislation. He announced that Serbia will hire 1,200 new police officers in the next six months to bolster security in schools and introduce tougher gun control laws, including stricter conditions for people to purchase weapons, doubling fines for people found breaking the law, requiring hunters to go through annual checks and a national gun buyback program for those who can't fulfil the tougher conditions. Until this week, mass shootings were rare in Serbia, despite the country's high rate of civilian gun ownership.