.ÏVIENNA: A mass shooting at several locations in the Austrian capital Vienna left at least two people dead and more than a dozen injured, shattering the city’s calm atmosphere and sending everyone into a panic. As music lovers enjoyed an opera and young people in bars raised a final glass together before a new coronavirus lockdown, multiple gunmen opened fire in Vienna at six central locations — including one near a synagogue — at around 8pm (1900 GMT).
Witnesses said they saw a man shoot “like crazy” with what appeared to be an automatic weapon before police arrived and opened fire. “They looked like firecrackers, then we realized that they were gunshots,” said one witness on public broadcaster TV.
With one assailant shot dead. The city’s mayor urged people to remain indoors . Austria’s Chancellor Sebastian Kurz termed the mass shooting “a despicable terror attack”.
However, he said that while one of the assailants “was neutralized”, there were several others that “appear to still be on the loose”. “They seem to also, as far as we know, be very well equipped, with automatic weapons. So they were very well prepared,” Kurz added.
With one of the locations being a synagogue, Vienna authorities said they were not ruling out the possibility of the attack being an anti-Semitic one.
We are in shock
Vienna had until now been spared the sort of major attacks that have hit other European countries, with France experiencing two terror attacks only last month. “We are dealing with a terror attack the severity of which, thank God, we have not experienced in Austria in many years,” the city’s mayor Michael Ludwig said at press conference early Tuesday.
“At the beginning, I thought to myself that maybe we were making an American film or that they had drunk too much,” said waiter Jimmy Eroglu, 42. But then he heard shots. “The police came in and said, ‘you all have to stay inside because there’s a probably a dead man there’.”
Hands up, take off your jacket
Vienna’s police repeatedly urged residents to shelter in place as the manhunt got underway. The helicopters are sweeping the skies above the city. The officers hastily erecting cordons on streets that only hours earlier were thronged with people enjoying a last drink before lockdown.
Robert Schneider, who lives in central Vienna, left his house briefly and found two lasers trained on his chest. “Hands up, take off your jacket,” officers shouted at him, the 39-year-old told. “We had seen nothing, heard nothing. We are in shock.”
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Gernot Gruber, 25, said he initially thought the sounds were fireworks set off by people ahead of the lockdown. “If you hear these noises in Austria, you don’t think they’re gunshots, you really don’t,” he told the local newspaper.
Gruber, en route to the Hard Rock cafe around the corner from one of the sites of the attacks, said. He had heard about similar incidents in other countries. “But I’ve never been close to one. It was really frightening.”
Pakistan ‘strongly condemns’ mass shooting in Austria
Pakistan on Tuesday reiterated “its condemnation of terrorism in all its forms and manifestations”. Following a mass shooting in the Austrian capital that left at least two people dead and almost 15 injured.
“Pakistan strongly condemns the heinous terrorist attack in Central Vienna on Monday night, resulting in loss of precious lives & wounding many more,” the Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Twitter.
#Pakistan strongly condemns the heinous terrorist attack in Central #Vienna on Monday night,resulting in loss of precious lives & wounding many more.
We extend our deepest condolences & sympathies to families of victims & wish speedy recovery to those injured.1/2@MFA_Austria
— Spokesperson 🇵🇰 MoFA (@ForeignOfficePk) November 3, 2020
“We extend our deepest condolences & sympathies to families of victims & wish speedy recovery to those injured,” they added.