At least one gunman opened fire at Azerbaijan’s prestigious oil training institution yesterday, killing 13 people and wounding 10, the government said.
Chief paramedic Mursal Hamidov, speaking to reporters at the sealed-off boundary of the Azerbaijan State Oil Academy, said the attacker had committed suicide, but the government did not confirm that.
Police would give no details, but the Health Ministry and prosecutors said 13 were dead and 10 wounded.
CONFLICTING REPORTS
Conflicting media reports had said there were as many as four attackers, but a witness spoke only of one.
TV footage from inside the academy showed victims lying face down in the corridors, apparently dead, with blood seeping onto the floor. Crying women were shown walking hurriedly out of the building and students carried others, apparently injured, out of the building. The footage was shown on Russia’s Channel One news.
The Interior Ministry said a special police operation had ended.
FEW DETAILS
But details of the incident — including the identity of the suspected killer — were not immediately available.
Bekir Belek, a Turkish student, spoke to Turkey’s CNN-Turk television from a hospital in Baku.
“We were in an exam, we heard gunshots, we went out of the classroom in panic and saw a gunman opening fire on everyone, three of my friends were shot,” Belek told CNN-Turk television.
“Everywhere was covered in blood, all corridors. There are many wounded,” he said. “We were trying to escape but had to return when my friends were shot, we took them to hospital.”
“There were bodies at each floor,” said Ibrahim Kar, another Turkish student at the hospital.
SHOT AT ANYONE
Ilgar Mamedov, whose father was shot in the head in the attack and spoke to other victims in a hospital ward, outlined his account of the shooting. Mamedov’s father is an employee of the academy.
Mamedov said the gunman was a short man who walked the halls of the academy taking aim at the head of anyone standing within range and shooting.
If it was apparent a victim was not dead after a first shot, the attacker shot again, Mamedov said.
ELITE ACADEMY
The academy, which has existed under a variety of names since the beginning of the 20th century, has long been recognized as a major international center for the training of oil industry specialists.
Among its graduates are Vagit Alekperov, the president of Lukoil, Russia’s biggest independent oil producer; Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos; Heydar Aliyev, Azerbaijan’s first post-Soviet president; and Lavrenti Beria, the head of the Soviet secret police under Josef Stalin.
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