Two men opened fire on Russian reservists at a training camp in Belgorod oblast, a region bordering Ukraine, killing 11 people on the spot and injuring 15 others. The incident occurred on Saturday afternoon and Russian authorities have classified as a terrorist attack.
According to the Russian Defense Ministry, two citizens of one of the CIS countries (ex-Soviet allies of Russia) began shooting with small arms at the training ground of the Belgorod Western Military District during a live-fire training class for reservists. who are going to participate in the Russian military campaign against Ukraine.
The two men, whose nationality has not been disclosed, were later killed.
According to relatives of the victims, who quotes the Sota Telegram channel, the military station is located in the town of Soloti. Another channel, Mash, ensures that the dead reservists come from the Briansk region, also in the European part of Russia and bordering Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin decreed a partial military mobilization on September 21 to reinforce the troops he had sent to Ukraine seven months earlier. The goal, Russian authorities later said, was to recruit 300,000 reservists. Before being sent to the battlefront, they must undergo a period of military training in military camps like this one where the incident occurred.
The mobilization will be completed by the end of October, Putin assured last Thursday. "A total of 222,000 people out of 300,000 have already been mobilized. All mobilization activities will be completed in about two weeks," the Kremlin chief told a news conference in the Kazakh capital Astana, held after the Summit of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Measures in Asia.
