In the early hours of Wednesday, a teenage boy opened fire at a school in Serbia’s capital, killing eight children and a school guard, the police have said.

The police, in a statement, said the shooting took place at Vladislav Ribnikar Primary School in the capital.

Identified as K.K., the shooter was said to have used his father’s handgun to fire multiple shots into a crowd at the school.

“I was able to hear the shooting. It was non-stop. I didn’t know what was happening. We were receiving some messages on the phone,” said a student in a sports class downstairs when the gunfire erupted.

The police said the suspect in the shooting spread was arrested in the schoolyard.

Six more children and a teacher were injured and hospitalised.

“All police forces are still on the ground working intensively to shed light on all the facts and circumstances that led to this tragedy,” said a statement posted by Serbia’s Ministry of public affairs on its social media platform.

Unlike in the United States, mass shootings in Serbia and the wider Balkan region are extremely rare.

In the last mass shooting in 2013, a Balkan war veteran killed 13 people in a central Serbian village.