Foreign News
Prague shooting: Gunman dead after killing more than 15 at Charles University
More than 15 people have been killed and 24 injured in a shooting at a university in Prague, officials say.
Police said the gunman had also been “eliminated” following the shooting at Charles University – the deadliest attack in modern Czech history.
Prime Minister Petr Fiala said he had cancelled upcoming engagements in light of the “tragic events” on Thursday. University staff were told to stay put, barricade themselves in rooms and turn off the lights.
Footage has emerged on social video showing terrified crowds fleeing the area popular with tourists.
Police received first reports of shooting at the university’s Faculty of Arts on Jan Palach Square in the centre of the capital after 15:00 local time (14:00 GMT).
At a briefing later on Thursday, the police and city authorities said the gunman was a student at the faculty. They said he was a 24-year-old from a village 21km (13 miles) outside Prague. The suspect’s father had been found dead earlier on Thursday. The gunman’s motives were not immediately known.
Preliminary information suggested that no police officers were injured in the attack, the authorities said.
Sergey Medvedev, a professor at the university, told the BBC he was in the auditorium when the shootings began. “I was giving a lecture at the moment and at first didn’t quite realise what happened because there were some sounds. The students, I think, heard it better because I was so much concentrated on my talking, on my lecture,” he said.
“Then, we understood that something big is happening. There was nothing online yet, nothing in the Czech press and the news networks. Then at some point, the special operation groups went storming in, they searched the room briefly and then went out… they told us to stay inside. “One hour later, another police squad broke in and then put us on the floor, briefly searched us then evacuated from the building,” the professor added.
Verified images from the scene appeared to show people clinging on to the outside wall of the university building, several storeys up.
Targ Patience, a British-Australian who was staying in a flat near the scene, told the BBC that he heard “a lot of gunshots”. “I looked out of my balcony and saw the police arrive. A few officers were having a hard time stopping people walking towards the scene,” he sad.
“We heard four loud gunshots,” Joe Hyland, 18, from Truro, Cornwall, told the BBC. “Everyone was sprinting and running for cover. “I have a bad knee, am on a crutch. So I hobbled as quickly as possible,” added Hyland, who was on his first holiday with friends. “We got to the metro and went down there because we thought it would be safest.”
Students said they had barricaded themselves in classrooms. “Currently stuck inside my classroom in Prague,” Jakob Weizman, a student at Charles University, wrote on X (formerly Twitter) as it unfolded.
“Locked the door before the shooter tried to open it.”
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen wrote on X that she was “shocked by the senseless violence”. She added: “We stand and mourn with you.”
An email to staff at the philosophy faculty of Charles University, seen by Reuters, warned staff of the shooting. It read: “Stay put, don’t go anywhere, if you’re in the offices, lock them and place furniture in front of the door, turn off the lights.”
Authorities said the whole of the square and several streets around the university were closed.
Charles University is located in Prague’s Old Town, about 500m from the historic Charles Bridge, a tourist magnet.
(BBC)
The US Supreme Court has ordered the Trump administration to facilitate the return of a Maryland man, who was mistakenly deported to El Salvador’s notorious mega-jail.
The Trump administration had conceded that Kilmar Abrego Garcia was deported by accident, but appealed against a federal court’s order to return him to the US.
On Thursday, in a 9-0 ruling, the Supreme Court declined to block the lower court’s order.
The judge’s order “requires the Government to ‘facilitate’ Abrego Garcia’s release from custody in El Salvador and to ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent”, the justices ruled.
(BBC)
A Russian-American citizen has been released in a prisoner swap between Moscow and Washington.
Amateur ballerina Ksenia Karelina, a Los Angeles resident, had been in prison in Russia for over a year, after being arrested in the city of Yekaterinburg in early 2024.
She was found guilty of treason for donating money to a US-based charity providing humanitarian support to Ukraine and was sentenced to 12 years in a penal colony.
In exchange, the US reportedly freed Arthur Petrov, a dual German-Russian citizen arrested in Cyprus in 2023. He was accused of illegally exporting microelectronics to Russia for manufacturers working with the Russian military.
[BBC]
A nationwide general strike disrupted public services across Greece, with ferries tied up in port, flights grounded and public transport running only part-time as labour unions press for higher wages to cope with rising living costs.
The 24-hour strike on Wednesday was called by the two main umbrella unions covering the public and private sectors, seeking a full return of collective bargaining rights which were scrapped as part of international bailouts during Greece’s financial crisis.
Greece has emerged from a 2009-18 debt crisis, which saw rolling cuts in wages and pensions in turn for bailouts worth about 290 billion euros ($319bn) and economic growth seen at 2.3 percent this year, outpacing other eurozone economies.
Tapping on the country’s progress, the conservative government increased the monthly minimum wage by a cumulative 35 percent to 880 euros ($970). But many households still struggle to make ends meet amid rising food, power and housing costs, the labour unions say.
The country braces for further global financial turmoil triggered by US tariffs.
[Aljazeera]
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