15 people were killed by a gunman in a swastika shirt, 11 of them children. On Monday 26 September, he also wounded 24 others at a Russian elementary school. Investigators said that he then committed suicide.
Artem Kazantsev, in his early thirties was identified by authorities as the attacker. Two security guards were killed by the attacker before he opened fire on teachers at School Number88, Izhevsk, where he was once an undergraduate.
Russia’s Investigative Committee is charged with major crimes. It said it was investigating the neo Nazi connections of the perpetrator.
According to the committee, investigators are conducting a search at the victim’s home in an effort to identify the attacker and determine his views. “Inquiries continue into his adherence to neofascist ideas as well as Nazi ideology.
Investigators released a video showing the body found in a classroom with bloodstained papers and overturned furniture. He was wearing a black shirt with a red swastika.
The Investigative Committee found that 24 of the injured were children. Alexander Brechalov (region governor) stated that many types of operations have been performed by surgeons.
He said the attacker had been registered with a “psycho-neurological” treatment facility. Investigators discovered that the suspect was carrying several rounds of ammunition and two guns.
Dmitry Peskov (a Kremlin spokesperson) said that President Vladimir Putin “deeply regretted” his loss. Peskov described the incident as “a terrorist act by a person who seems to belong to an neofascist group or organization”.
He claimed that Putin had instructed doctors, psychologists and neurosurgeons from Izhevsk, which is approximately 970 km, 600 miles east-east of Moscow.
Russia has seen numerous school shootings in recent years.
Kazan gunman, aged seventeen, shot and killed seven Kazan children and two adults in Kazan in May 2021. At least six people were killed when a student armed with a hunting rifle opened fire at Perm University, in the Urals.
In April 2022, an armed man attacked a kindergarten in central Ulyanovsk and killed two children and their teacher. The man then committed suicide.
A mass shooting took place at a Russian-occupied college in Crimea, which was occupied by Moscow last year. It claimed the lives of 20 students and their families.
