CETINJE: Montenegro on Thursday began three days of national mourning, a day after a gunman went on a rampage, killing 12 people including two children.

The 45-year-old gunman died after shooting himself in the head when he was surrounded following an hours-long manhunt, police said early on Thursday.

The killing spree started around 5:30pm on Wednesday at a restaurant in Bajice, a village near the southern town of Cetinje, according to police.

“Twelve people were killed, of whom two were children,” prosecutor Andrijana Nastic told reporters in Cetinje. The victims were killed at five different locations, with the first four in the restaurant, the prosecutor said. Police said the two murdered children were aged 10 and 13. Four people were also seriously injured and transported to a hospital in the capital, Podgorica. All four were at an intensive care unit and their lives were in danger, a hospital statement said.

“To kill children ... is completely senseless. That is not a crime, it is something more than that,” pensioner Danilo Zecevic said in Cetinje.

The streets of Cetinje and Bajice were deserted, and a police patrol was stationed in front of the gunman’s house at the entry to the village, according to a photographer.

Podgorica mayor Sasa Mujovic said that candles would be lit for the victims at the capital’s main square on Thursday evening. According to police chief Lazar Scepanovic, the suspect “had consumed alcoholic beverages all day long” before an altercation between him and another restaurant guest.

Published in Dawn, January 3rd, 2025