Czech police have stepped up security around schools and other public buildings across the country, while Charles University in Prague today canceled all lectures and events after yesterday’s massacre that left 14 dead.

It’s about the worst such incident to have occurred in the country that of central Europe, where many people own guns, some hunting or sporting rifles, but incidents of indiscriminate shooting are rare.

People have been lighting candles since last night outside the university’s medieval headquarters in the city center and the heads of the country’s universities plan to pay their respects there later today.

“We have adopted precautionary measures across the country from today in relation to soft targets and schools,” the police said via the X platform.

“We have no information about any specific threat … this is a signal that we are here and prepared.”

Interior Minister Vit Rakusan told Czech radio that 13 of the 14 dead have been identified. The ministry reported that the injured included two citizens of the United Arab Emirates and a Dutchman.

Authorities did not release new information on the condition of the injured.

Prague

The 24-year-old attacker died yesterday in the university building, possibly by suicide or by a policeman’s bullet, the police announced.

Police announced yesterday that the 24-year-old, who had a firearms license and a clean criminal record, was a student at Charles University’s School of Fine Arts where the shootings took place.

Police also said the suspect, who asked not to be named, had killed his father at a residence outside Prague before moving to the capital.

The police had information that he intended to kill himself and were looking for him in another building of the university, where he was going to attend a lecture.

But the suspected attacker went instead to the School of Fine Arts building, in a busy square across the bank from Prague Castle and a few hundred meters from Old Town Square, one of Europe’s most important tourist attractions.

The government declared tomorrow, Saturday, a day of national mourning.

Police Chief Martin Vodracek said yesterday that police were looking into unconfirmed reports of the gunman’s possible connection to a social media account that claimed to be inspired by an incident of indiscriminate shooting at a crowd of people in Russia, but there was no confirmation of that.