An Iranian man, depressed about losing his job and his imminent wedding, held a group of young schoolboys hostage at gunpoint for more than two hours on Thursday before being overpowered.
Iranian special forces and police surrounded Razi boys’ primary school in upmarket northern Tehran after the man armed with a Kalashnikov assault rifle (AK-47) seized about 25 youngsters and their teachers shortly after classes started.
But the attacker, said to be suffering psychological problems, surrendered about two and a half hours later when police stormed the school and the hostages were freed without bloodshed.
An interior ministry spokesperson said the gunman had fired shots into the air after he barged into a physical education class. Staff were able to alert police and special forces who surrounded the school.
”It was a man of about 25, he suddenly appeared in the gym class with a bag of weapons and shouted: ‘I will shoot at the first person who comes into the room,”’ said one of the children.
Tehran’s deputy police chief Morteza Bateni identified the man only as Mehdi and said he was employed on contract with the police, without specifying his job.
”He was suffering psychological problems and stole a weapon from his workplace… but he did not want to do the children any harm,” Bateni told state television.
”I am going to be married in a few days, I have a lot of problems and I’m going to lose my job, that’s why I stole a weapon,” the gunmen was quoted as saying by the school principal.
Iran’s student news agency Isna said the man had asked to speak to police, who passed him on to his mother to try to reason with him, according to the principal.
The hostage-taker broke down as he spoke with his mother, pupils said, and police seized the opportunity to storm the room and overpower him.
The enormous financial and social burden of getting married puts young Iranians under tremendous pressure, made even greater by the country’s high unemployment rate. — Sapa-AFP