Lhe assessment of the drama is not final for the moment. Monday, December 13, in Serpoukhov, a town located a hundred kilometers south of Moscow, an 18-year-old “blew himself up” in his former Orthodox school. According to police reports, besides his own person, he also injured at least one other person, aged 15. The Interior Ministry of the Moscow region has also specified that this attack took place in the neighboring establishment of the Vvedensky Vladytchny Convent.
“An 18-year-old former student of this school entered and blew himself up and, according to preliminary data, he was injured, as well as a 15-year-old teenager,” the ministry said in a statement. “The police officers on the spot evacuated the teaching team and the students”, he continued, noting that the results were being “clarified”. Russian news agencies Ria Novosti, Tass and Interfax mentioned up to seven injured, citing unidentified police sources. According to the regional governor, Andreï Vorobiov, “the injured children are taken care of by the doctors, their life is not threatened”.
Rising shootings in Russia
Bomb attacks or school shootings were rare in Russia for a long time, but such tragedies have increased in recent years. Faced with this upsurge, a tightening of the legislation on the carrying of weapons was ordered by Vladimir Poutine. With these reforms, the age for acquiring hunting weapons was raised from 18 to 21, as was already the case for conventional weapons, and a reinforced medical examination was introduced.
2021 has been a particularly murderous year. The latest killing dates back to December 8, in Moscow, when a man killed two people and injured four others in a center welcoming Muscovites for their administrative procedures. But it is the places of education that have paid a heavy price.
A phenomenon “imported” from the United States?
On September 20, a student killed 6 people and left at least 28 injured in a shooting at Perm State University, a city in central Russia, before being wounded by a police officer and arrested. His only motivation, according to his writings, was to kill. He had a license to carry weapons. Before that, on May 11, 2021, a 19-year-old man opened fire at his old school in Kazan, in the Russian republic of Tatarstan, also in central Russia, killing nine. Also arrested, he also had a license for a semi-automatic weapon.
The deadliest shooting in recent Russian history dates back to October 2018, when a high school student killed 19 people before killing himself at a high school in Kerch, a town on Russia’s annexed Crimean peninsula of Ukraine. . Vladimir Poutine then blamed “globalization”, believing that the phenomenon of school shootings originated in the United States.
