Slovakia school attack leaves one dead and two injured

A school attack by a pupil in northwestern Slovakia on Tuesday left one 61-year-old woman dead and another woman and a child wounded, rescue workers told the AFP news agency.

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The two injured, including a 44-year-old “with a stab wound to the chest,” were admitted to hospital following the attack at the school in Staskov, Emergency Medical Services Operations Centre spokeswoman Petra Klimesova said.

Slovak media said the dead woman was a teacher and the two people wounded were another teacher and a pupil.

The attacker was a teenage pupil in eighth-grade (typically aged between 13 and 15), they said.

Police confirmed they were investigating “a violent crime,” adding: “The situation is now under control.”

Prime Minister Robert Fico expressed his “sincere condolences” and said he was following “the tragic incident in the village of Staskov with great concern.”

“Personally, I am deeply saddened by this,” he said in a statement.

President Peter Pelligrini said he was “shocked that this is yet another case in which a student attacked teachers and a classmate.”

“Aggression and an atmosphere of intolerance, spread primarily by social media and, unfortunately, by some politicians as well, are literally poisoning the public sphere and influencing the behavior of our children in schools,” he said.

He urged “all citizens to act in a way that calms the atmosphere, rather than further radicalising it.”

In January last year, an 18-year-old killed a fellow pupil and a teacher in a knife attack and wounded another pupil at a secondary school in the town of Spisska Stara Ves in northeastern Slovakia.

In 2020, a teacher was stabbed to death and several others wounded at an elementary school in central Slovakia, the first violent attack at a school in the central European country.