Thailand’s prime minister has ordered a halt to new firearms licences following a deadly school shooting last week, as the grandparents killed by the teenage gunman were laid to rest.
Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul said he had instructed the interior ministry and police to suspend licences for possessing, buying and carrying firearms. He also called for “tighter controls and decisive penalties”.
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On Friday, a 14-year-old boy shot dead the grandparents who had raised him at their home in Nonthaburi, north of Bangkok. He then went to his school, where he killed six people before taking his own life.
The couple’s white caskets stood beneath their portraits at Tem Rak Samakkhi Buddhist temple, where relatives and friends gathered for a cremation marking the end of a funeral that had lasted several days.
Among those paying respects was Tawee Piewphong, who remembered his brother-in-law – the grandfather – as “a man of few words, but a very kind person”.
Officials pay their respects at the Tem Rak Samakkhi Buddhist temple
Mr Tawee said he was stunned by the killings and did not know what had driven the teenager, but he urged people to view the boy with compassion.
“I want to tell him that being 14 is just a small fraction of your entire life, and every problem has a solution. Not everything is the end of the world,” said the 70-year-old.
He said the teenager might have killed his grandparents “so they would not be responsible for the actions he was going to take at school later”.
Ajima, a relative of the boy who asked for her surname to be withheld, said she felt profound sorrow for him.
“A boy at that age is like a blank piece of fabric. He must have gone through a lot of issues, but nobody knows why he resorted to shooting as a solution. I feel terribly sorry for him,” she said.
Investigators have yet to establish a motive, although police said on Sunday that the boy had viewed violent videos online and had previously taken a BB gun to school.
Investigators are still seeking a motive for the shooting
Officials had earlier said the teenager was under academic pressure, while a classmate reported that he had been bullied.
“I feel really sorry for the boy,” said Somjai Poosod, whose grandchildren attend the school. One of them was a friend of the shooter.
“Of course I feel bad for the innocent people who were killed, but I feel there is an issue of mental health that we may need to address to prevent incidents like this from happening again,” she added.
The shooter, whom AFP has chosen not to identify, used his grandfather’s gun to kill the couple before travelling to the school.
He shot five teachers and staff members there and wounded a 12-year-old girl, who died in hospital on Saturday.
Thailand has one of the region’s highest rates of gun ownership, yet repeated pledges to strengthen firearms laws have failed to stop a series of deadly shootings.
