Sweden mourned Wednesday as the country was left soul-searching by the deadliest mass shooting in its history, claiming 10 lives a day earlier in the central city of Orebro.
Several media outlets reported the suspected gunman turned his weapon on himself, but police have not confirmed those reports.
"Eleven people are dead, including the killer," police told Agence France-Presse (AFP) about Tuesday's massacre at Campus Risbergska, a secondary school for young adults.
Local health authorities said six people were being treated Wednesday at Orebro's university hospital.
Five of them – three women and two men – underwent surgery for gunshot wounds and were in "stable but serious" condition.
A woman was also being treated for minor injuries, Orebro County authorities said in a statement, adding that all the injured were over the age of 18.
"This is the worst mass shooting in Swedish history," Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson told a news conference late Tuesday. Kristersson noted that many "questions were still unanswered."
"But there will come a time when we will know what happened, how it could happen and what motives may have been behind it," Kristersson said, urging people not to "speculate."
"The motive for the shooting is not yet known, but all indications are that the perpetrator acted alone, without ideological motive," Orebro police said in a statement.
Police have not disclosed information about the identity or ages of the dead, nor whether they were students or teachers at the school.
School attacks are relatively rare in Sweden, but the country has suffered shootings and bombings linked to gang violence that kill dozens each year.
"The perpetrator is not known to the police; he has no gang affiliations. We believe there will be no further attacks," Orebro police chief Roberto Eid Forest told reporters Tuesday evening.
Swedish television channel TV4 reported that police raided the suspect's home in Orebro late Tuesday afternoon.
The suspect was around 35 years old, had a license to carry a weapon and had no criminal record, though no details about his identity were provided.
The man lived reclusively, was unemployed and had distanced himself from his family and friends, the newspaper Aftonbladet reported, citing family members.
The shooting erupted around midday Tuesday.
"I was standing there, watching what was happening and I was just around here when I saw some bodies lying on the ground. I don't know if they were dead or injured," said 16-year-old Linn, who attends a school near the massacre site, speaking to an AFP correspondent.
"There was blood everywhere, people were panicking and crying, parents were worried ... it was chaos," she added, her voice trembling.
Liv Demir, 36, whose son attends a school near Campus Risbergska, said she was shocked to hear of the shooting.
"I became numb, speechless. I didn't know where to go," she told AFP Wednesday morning. Her son also has gym classes at Campus Risbergska.
"So my thoughts were spiraling because I packed his sports bag in the morning," Demir said. Sweden's King Carl XVI Gustaf expressed his "sadness and dismay" in a statement Tuesday.
The Royal Court announced Wednesday that flags would be "flown at half-mast at all royal palaces" during the day. The government announced a similar measure for its offices and parliament.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen described the shooting as "truly horrifying."
"Such violence and terror have no place in our societies – least of all in schools. In this dark hour, we stand with the people of Sweden," she said in a post on X.
Though such shootings are rare, several violent incidents have struck Swedish schools in recent years. In March 2022, an 18-year-old student stabbed two teachers to death at a secondary school in Malmo.
Two months earlier, a 16-year-old was arrested after wounding another student and a teacher with a knife at a school in Kristianstad. In October 2015, three people were killed in a racially motivated attack at a school in the town of Trollhattan by a sword-wielding assailant later killed by police.
