A teenager suspected of seriously wounding a teacher with a firearm Wednesday at a school in Lukavac, northeastern Bosnia and Herzegovina, has been arrested by law enforcement, local authorities and the victim’s family announced, AFP reports.

The attack came a month after a 13-year-old student killed nine of his classmates and a security guard at a school in Belgrade, in neighboring Serbia.

“The boy, who is not yet 14 years old, is under police supervision at the police headquarters in Lukavac,” the Tuzla Canton Ministry of Internal Affairs said in a statement.

“Firearms and other abandoned items have been placed in a safe place pending an investigation,” the ministry added, noting that a school employee was injured.

According to Ahmed Omerovych, the education minister of the Tuzla canton, the alleged perpetrator of the attack is a former student who recently changed schools.

“The child was transferred to another school at the beginning of the second semester for disciplinary reasons,” the minister said, also announcing the suspension of classes in all schools in the Tuzla canton.

The victim was an English teacher who was also the deputy principal of this elementary school, the father of the deceased told local journalists.

In Bosnia, children from six to 15 years old study in these schools.

“It’s true, he’s my boy,” Ismet Osmanovic told regional television N1, adding that his son was hospitalized and underwent surgery. “The doctors told me that he is in a stable condition,” he added, the victim’s father.

Unknown amount of weapons illegally imported into Bosnia

According to the hospital located in the nearby city of Tuzla, the victim received a “gunshot wound to the neck”. “The patient was intubated and is currently undergoing surgery,” the Central Hospital of the University of Tuzla said in a statement quoted by the local press.

In early May, a shooting at a school in Belgrade, followed less than 48 hours later by a second shooting in which a 21-year-old suspect killed eight people, shocked Serbia and the entire Balkan region.

In several cities of the former Yugoslavia, including in Bosnia and Herzegovina, actions in memory of the victims were organized.

In Bosnia, during a bloody intercommunal war that left an estimated 100,000 dead in the 1990s, an unknown number of weapons were smuggled into the country.

After the end of the war, in 1995, the authorities repeatedly called on the Bosnians to hand them over, announcing an amnesty for all who would do so voluntarily. The police also took measures to seize weapons from the homes of the suspects for storage.

Despite these actions, a large number of weapons are still circulating in Bosnia. According to the research project Small Arms Survey (SAS), more than 31 in 100 residents own a firearm. In Serbia, this indicator is 39%, the highest in Europe. (Agerpress)