The Canadian capital, Ottawa, was thrown into turmoil on Wednesday when a gunman shot dead a soldier guarding the national war memorial before storming into parliament, making it into the heart of the building before being killed by a ceremonial official.
In scenes unlike any Canada has witnessed in its modern history, MPs barricaded themselves in a parliamentary caucus room by piling furniture against the doors, while others fled the building by clambering down scaffolding erected for repair work. Police went from room to room in parliament, breaking down some doors to check if anyone was hiding inside.
An air of panic was fuelled by initial, confused suggestions that more than one gunman was at large. But reports of a shooting at a shopping mall turned out to be unfounded.
The Canadian prime minister, Stephen Harper, was hustled away from Parliament Hill and was safe, a spokesperson confirmed. Cabinet minister Tony Clement tweeted that at least 30 shots were heard inside parliament, where Conservative and Liberal MPs were holding their weekly caucus meetings.
The perpetrator was later identified as Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, 32, but officials offered no immediate details about his background nor speculated on a motive for the shootings, which came two days after a recent convert to jihadi ideology ran down two soliders with his car near Montreal, killing one.
The sergeant-at-arms, Kevin Vickers, who normally plays only a ceremonial role in parliament, was reported to have shot the gunman dead.
A member of parliament, Craig Scott, tweeted: “MPs and Hill staff owe their safety, even lives, to Kevin Vickers, who shot attacker just outside the MPs’ caucus rooms.”
The shooter opened fire on the ceremonial guard of Ottawa’s war memorial, just across from the parliament buildings, just before 10am. Despite efforts of bystanders, who performed CPR, one of the soldiers guarding the memorial, Corporal Nathan Cirillo, died shortly after.
From there, the attacker made his way across the street, onto the front lawn of parliament. It remains unclear how the attacker made his way past the armed guards protecting the building, but he got as far as the ornate Hall of Honour. Adjacent rooms were filled with MPs from the governing Conservatives and opposition New Democrats, both parties holding separate discussions on new efforts to crack down on homegrown terrorism.
Justin Ling, a freelance political journalist who was at the parliament when the incident began, reported multiple shots inside the building. “At one point, standing next to the fire escape, we heard a series of loud bangs. Five or six in rapid succession. We scattered around the room and took cover. A few were loudly praying. A few others were laughing nervously,” he said.
The gunman was finally brought down just outside the parliamentary library at the end of the Hall of Honour.
Marc-André Viau, a senior parliamentary press secretary, stepped out of parliament just before the gunman forced his way in. “It lasted, like, two minutes. I walk out, I take cover, the guy runs in, the shots are fired,” he said.
“It’s surreal because I’ve been working on the hill for, like, six years, and I’ve never seen anything close,” said Viau, speaking from the food court of a nearby building. “Never had to, in my life, take cover because there was a shooter somewhere,” said Viau.
In the area around the parliament building, some workers fled their offices while others were advised to lock themselves in and stay away from windows. Squads of police in body armour made their way through the streets with their guns drawn searching for any assailants still at large.
The Globe and Mail news website reported a police officer yelling to journalists to move away from the Rideau shopping centre, shouting: “Move down! There’s an active shooter! If you want to die, stay here. If you want to live, keep moving!” Police later said there were no shootings at the mall.
Witnesses report the gunman was dressed in black when he drove up to the war memorial in downtown Ottawa.
“I looked out the window and saw a shooter, a man dressed all in black with a kerchief over his nose and mouth and something over his head as well, holding a rifle and shooting an honour guard in front of the cenotaph point-blank, twice,” a witness, Tony Zobl, told the Canadian Press news agency.
“The honour guard dropped to the ground, and the shooter kind of raised his arms in triumph holding the rifle.” – The Guardian UK.
