10 people were killed in a shooting at an adult education a center in Sweden

On Tuesday, a shooting at an adult education campus in central Sweden killed at least ten people and injured an unknown number of others, in what the prime minister described as the country's deadliest mass shooting in history.

During a news conference on Tuesday, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson expressed his condolences to the victims and their families, as well as his gratitude to the police. “We’ve today seen brutal, deadly violence against completely innocent people – this is the worst mass shooting in Swedish history,” he said.

Swedish media described the institution as Campus Risbergska, which serves adults, including immigrants and persons with impairments, and is located around 125 miles west of Stockholm.

Gunnar Strommer, the country's justice minister, confirmed that the suspect was among the deceased. However, the authorities provided little other facts, including the person's identification and potential reason.

“We do not think there is any terror motive behind this, but it is too early in the investigation to say,” Roberto Eid Forest, the head of the local police, said on Tuesday evening. “We think we have the perpetrator,” he added, “but we are not ruling out anything.”

A major operation is still underway after shots were fired around 12:33 p.m. local time (6:33 a.m. ET), police said in a press release, adding that “the charges are currently attempted murder, arson and aggravated weapons offense,” without specifying who exactly had been charged.

Shootings are uncommon in Swedish schools, but the country has experienced a rise in violent crime in recent years. This year, the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention reported that its homicide rate has increased to one of the highest in the European Union.

While Sweden has stringent gun rules, with permits often confined to hunting rifles, criminologists have connected an increase in shootings to the underground drug trade and armament stocks brought in from postwar Balkan nations, Eastern Europe, and Turkey. According to authorities, gangs nurture and recruit youngsters as young as 11 to work as contract murderers.