Police said the suspect was in custody but was too confused to be questioned.
Bangkok, Thailand:
A 14-year-old boy was arrested Tuesday after a shooting at a packed shopping center in Bangkok that left two people dead and five injured. Hundreds of panicked shoppers rushed into the streets in panic.
Witnesses told AFP of chaotic scenes when shots rang out at around 4.30pm (0930 GMT) in the upscale Siam Paragon shopping center in the heart of the Thai capital.
The shooting comes just days before the first anniversary of the deadliest massacre in modern Thai history, when an ex-police officer armed with a gun and knife attacked a daycare center in the country’s north, killing 24 children and 12 adults .
National police chief Torsak Sukwimol told reporters that two women – one Chinese and one from Myanmar – were killed in the shopping center shooting, and five other people were injured.
He said the 14-year-old suspect was in custody but was too confused to be questioned.
“He is a psychiatric patient at Rajavithi Hospital and he has not been taking his medications,” Torsak said.
“He said it was like there was another man telling him who to shoot.”
Video footage showed a long-haired boy wearing a black shirt, glasses and a cap with an American flag motif being taken into police custody.
Yuthana Srettanan, director of the Erawan Emergency Center, told reporters that all but one of the women shot were women.
Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin offered his condolences to the families of the victims and said he was closely monitoring the situation.
“What I care about most right now is the safety of all citizens,” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
“I ask all employees to monitor the situation, and may everyone be safe.”
A private school called The Essence, just meters from Siam Paragon, confirmed that the suspect was one of their students and extended its condolences to the families of the victims.
“We will cooperate with authorities and investigators for the benefit of those involved,” Wiwat Catithammanit, director of the $4,000-per-term school, said in a statement.
‘Multiple gunshots’
Witnesses described scenes of panic as the attack took place at Siam Paragon, one of Bangkok’s top shopping destinations, hugely popular with tourists and Thais alike.
“Around 4:30 p.m. I heard loud gun noises continuously, about ten times,” Thanpawasit Singthongkham, 31, who works at a Japanese restaurant in the mall, told AFP.
“Then the department store announced that a shooting had taken place. The emergency sign was turned on and everyone ran to get out.”
In footage he shared with AFP, he captured a horde of terrified shoppers walking under metal security gates blocking store entrances before fleeing down the emergency stairs amid loud sirens.
In another video, shared on Facebook and verified by AFP, dozens of people are seen in the shopping center’s parking garage, driven by loudspeakers.
Dozens of police vehicles and several ambulances could be seen outside one of the mall’s main entrances after the shooting.
“I heard several gunshots – about three times – and saw people running towards the exit,” Nattanon Dungsunenarn, who was shopping at a branch of Boots pharmacy, told AFP.
“It was very chaotic and it seemed like a lot of people didn’t know what exactly was going on.”
‘Terrified’
“We didn’t know what was going on, but then a shop staff asked us to go inside and said there was a gunman,” 41-year-old Chinese tourist Xiong Ying told AFP.
“Everyone was trying to find a place to hide. So many people were terrified, just like a scene in the zombie movies.
“I feel quite scared now. It happened exactly two minutes after we left by crossing the bridge. We even took pictures there.”
Nearly a year after the Oct. 6 daycare massacre, the mall shooting will raise new questions about gun control in Thailand, which has one of the highest gun ownership rates in the region.
In 2020, a former army officer went on rampage at a shopping center in Korat, killing 29 people and injuring many more.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
