Tragedy Strikes Bosnian High School: Three Dead in Shooting

Three staff members at a high school in Sanski Most, Bosnia, were killed by a school employee who then attempted suicide. The suspect was gravely injured and is under emergency treatment. An ongoing investigation is scrutinizing the incident, which did not involve children as the school was still on summer break.

Three staff members of a high school in the western Bosnian town of Sanski Most were killed on Wednesday when a school employee shot them and then tried to commit suicide, police said.

Police were notified at 10:15 AM (0815 GMT) that a man had opened fire at the school with an automatic rifle, police spokesman for Una-Sana canton, Adnan Beganovic, stated. The shooter killed the school dean, the secretary, and a teacher, he said.

"He tried to commit suicide and was gravely injured," Beganovic said, adding that the suspect was transferred for emergency treatment in the nearby town of Banja Luka. An investigation is underway, he said.

The school had not yet reopened from the summer holidays, so no children were involved. N1 TV, citing witnesses, reported that a janitor who had a history of disagreements with the management and was under disciplinary proceedings, sought out specific people and shot them. Reuters could not immediately verify that report.

Mass shootings are comparatively rare in the Western Balkans, which is awash with weapons that remained in private hands from wars in the 1990s. In July, a war veteran in neighboring Croatia shot five people, including his mother, in a nursing home and wounded six others.

(With inputs from agencies.)