School shooting in Belgrade leaves 8 children dead

A seventh-grade student in Serbia opened fire in class killing at least eight children and a security guard Wednesday, the country's interior ministry said in a statement.

Milan Milosevic, the father of one of the students at the Vladislav Ribnikar elementary school, said his daughter escaped the scene when the rampage started.

“She managed to escape. [The boy] ... first shot the teacher and then he started shooting randomly," Milosevic told broadcaster N1.

Milan Nedeljkovic, mayor of the central Vracar district where the school is located, said doctors were fighting to save the teacher’s life.

The suspect "planned the shooting for a month and made a list of kids he planned to kill," Veselin Milic, Belgrade's police chief, told journalists.

"The sketch looks like something from a video game or a horror movie, which indicates that he planned in detail, by classes, whom to liquidate," Milic added.

"All police forces are still on the ground and are intensively working to shed light on all the facts and circumstances that led to this tragedy."

The causes of the mass shooting are yet to be ascertained in which a teacher and six other children were wounded.

According to the interior ministry, eight children and a security guard were killed and six children were hospitalised along with the teacher.

The suspected shooter has been arrested.

The causes of the shooting are currently unclear and the police are investigating the crime, they said.

Milosevic, after rushing to the scene, said: "I saw the security guard lying under the table. I saw two girls with blood on their shirts. They say he [the shooter] was quiet and a good pupil."

A girl who attends a high school near Vladislav Ribnikar told state TV RTS: "I saw kids running out from the school, screaming. Parents came, they were in a panic. Later I heard three shots."

Such mass shooting incidents are extremely rare in Serbia which has very strict laws about gun possession.