In brief
A junior high student was shot dead in Zamboanga City when a fellow student illegally brought a .45‑calibre pistol into the school. The shooter fired first at a teacher, missed, then killed a student before hurrying to suicide. Authorities claim the incident is part of a worrying pattern of school shootings in the Philippines. The event echoes a high‑school shooting in Tacloban that left three dead and 20 wounded two months earlier.
A student at a Catholic junior high school in the southern Philippines was shot dead by a fellow student, who later took his own life, a local official said on Tuesday.
The alleged shooter is said to have smuggled a .45‑calibre pistol into a classroom at the school in Zamboanga City, according to Mayor Khymer Adan Olaso, who spoke to local radio.
The shooter fired first at a teacher seated at the table but missed. He then moved to another classroom and shot a student, who subsequently died, Olaso added.
Alleged livestream footage of the shooting, circulated by local media, appeared to be from a first‑person perspective, showing a gun barrel moving down a hallway, AFP News Agency reported.
Police say the situation was under control and there were no more active shooters.
The incident comes two months after a high school shooting in Tacloban City that left three students killed and 20 others wounded.
The suspects in that shooting were two teenage boys, one of whom regularly played an explicitly violent online game. The sandbox game, Gorebox, has been banned in the Philippines and the Senate is investigating the effects of violent computer games on young people.
Across Southeast Asia, authorities are looking at restricting social media use for minors, citing possible ill effects.
Earlier this month, a Thai teenager killed eight people and himself at his school. Authorities said he consumed violent content on social media.
