Five people, including a policeman, were killed and several injured in eastern Georgia when a former soldier opened fire from a balcony before killing himself, authorities in this Caucasus country reported on Friday.
The killing took place Thursday evening in Sagarejo, a town of about 10,000 inhabitants located about fifty kilometers east of Tbilisi, the capital.
Intervention of special forces
According to the Interior Ministry, the man opened fire with an automatic weapon from the balcony of an apartment, killing four people in the courtyard of this apartment building, as well as a police officer who arrived on the scene .
In addition, five people were injured, one seriously, according to the same source.
“
A special forces commando arrived, called him to surrender.
Of course, he fired again
,” Interior Minister Vakhtang Gomelauri said.
When special forces broke down the apartment door, the suspect committed suicide by shooting himself in the head, he added.
Unknown motives
The shooter's motives were not immediately known.
According to initial information, the shooter, born in 1974, had served in the Georgian armed forces between 2006 and 2021 and had notably been deployed in Afghanistan, according to Vakhtang Gomelauri.
This killing caused a shock in Georgia: while incidents involving firearms are frequent, mass killings are rare.
In October, a man opened fire in a restaurant in Batumi (west), killing one person.
The small Caucasus country, which is still recovering from a lightning war lost against Russia in 2008, has been shaken for several months by a political crisis linked to the imprisonment of former President Mikheil Saakashvili.
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