Gunman kills his mother, five others at Croatia care home

The suspect, a war veteran, enters a private nursing home in Daruvar, killing six in a rare instance of gun violence in the Balkan country.

A gunman has entered a private nursing home in northwestern Croatia and shot dead five people, including his mother, and injured six others, a government minister says.

One of the people wounded on Monday later died in hospital, taking the death toll to six, while four remained in critical condition, Marin Piletic, minister for labour, the pension system, families and social policy, told reporters.

One of the victims was a nursing home employee, the minister said.

“According to the information we have, the mother of the killer had been in the nursing home for 10 years,” Piletic said.

Authorities have given no motive for the attack.

Croatian media reported that the gunman, born in 1973, is a war veteran. The suspect fled the scene, but the police soon caught him in a cafe near the care home in Daruvar, a spa town in the municipality of Slavonia with a population of 8,500.

Police said they were informed of the incident at 10:10am (08:10 GMT) and confirmed the suspect had entered the nursing home and used a firearm.

The suspect is “under police supervision”, according to a statement by the regional police office.

Police said the assailant used an unregistered gun. There are many weapons kept in private homes in Croatia after the breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s and the wars that followed.

The attack has left the quiet town stunned and grieving. The mayor of Daruvar, Damir Lnenicek, told N1 that everyone was in shock.

“What is the cause, the trigger, it is difficult to say. That will be determined by the investigation,” Lnenicek said, adding that the tragedy happened in a private home where about 20 people live.

President Zoran Milanovic said he was “shocked” by the “savage, unprecedented crime”.

“It is a frightening warning and a last call to all competent institutions to do more to prevent violence in society, including even more rigorous control of gun ownership,” he said.

Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic condemned the crime.

“This is really a monstrous act of the murder of a group of people, of the mother and other very old people who happened to be there,” he said.

Shootings in Croatia are rare, and Monday’s incident is among the worst in Croatia’s history since it declared independence in 1991.

Last year, neighbouring Serbia was rocked by back-to-back mass shootings, including at a school in the capital, Belgrade, in which 10 people were killed.