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Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
World
Rachel Hagan

Former mayor among three killed in shooting at Philippines university graduation ceremony

At least three people were killed in a brazen shooting at a university graduation ceremony in the Philippines' capital region on Sunday.

Among the dead appears to include the former mayor of Lamitan City, Rose Furigay.

The gunman, who was armed with two pistols, was wounded in a shootout with a campus security officer and arrested after a car chase, but is now in custody and being interrogated.

The Ateneo de Manila University in suburban Quezon city university was swiftly put under lockdown and the graduation was also cancelled.

Supreme Court Chief Justice Alexander Gesmundo, who was supposed to be a guest speaker at the ceremony, was on his way to the university when the attack happened and was urgently advised to turn back.

Among the dead appears to include the assassination of the former mayor of the southern Lamitan city, Rose Furigay (Twitter)

Quezon City Mayor Joy Belmonte condemned the attack and said in a statement: “This kind of incident has no place in our society and must be condemned to the highest level."

The Metro Manila Development Authority confirmed that the shooting took place at 2.55 p.m local time, around 7 am BST.

Officials said those killed in the attack were Ms Furigay, her aide and a university guard.

The suspect is from Lamitan city in Basilan province (Twitter)

Furigay was arriving to attend her daughter's graduation at the law school of Ateneo de Manila University, one of the country's most prestigious, Quezon City police chief Remus Medina said.

Guns are banned by police and other government forces in Quezon city, the city where newly elected President Ferdinand Marcos Junior was set to deliver his first state of the nation address on Monday.

Guns kill one in every 100,000 people in the Southeast Asian country, which is one of the highest rates in Asia.

To possess a gun in the country people must be 21 years old and take a firearm safety seminar, despite this you can own up to 15 guns per person.

"He looks like he was a determined assassin," Medina said.

The suspect is from Lamitan city in Basilan province, a stronghold of Abu Sayyaf of the pro-Islamist State extremist group.

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