PM Stephen Harper was hustled to a safe locationand is expected to speak later tonight. He spoke by phone with US president Barack Obama, who condemned the attack and offered support. The FBI is actively assisting Canadian authorities.
Canadian police authorities refused to say whether there could be multiple suspects, saying that the operation is “active” and “fluid”. The deceased suspect was described by witnesses as in his 20s or 30s, with dark hair and just under 6ft tall.
“All of a sudden I just heard a shot, turned around, and there was a guy with a rifle … and just pow pow,” comes a bystander’s account of today’s shooting on Parliament Hill. My colleagues in London have compiled a number of witness stories:
“I heard four shots ring out,” Jan Luchtenburg told reporters, his voice shaking. “Suddenly I saw a small guy with long black hair … with a long rifle, and he ran away from the shots.”
“All of a sudden I just heard a shot, turned around and there was a guy with a rifle … and just pow pow,” bystander Reevo Namic told CBC News. “Then I saw one of the other armed forces guys just running. He barrelled over, just ran right over. The other guy just dropped. I looked back, just dived underneath and called immediately 911.”
Inside parliament, people could only heard the shots, turn off the lights and barricade the door.
Sandra Bales also heard the shots. “I stuck my head out of the office door, thinking, “What’s going on? I saw someone running up the stairs and knew something immediately was wrong, locked the door, turned off the lights and crawled under my desk,” she told CBC News. She stayed there for 20 minutes, she said, “until security came by, guns drawn. They said, ‘you’re doing the right thing. Stay where you’re at.’”
MP Charlie Angus told the Ottawa Citizen. “A series of gunshots rang out and we realised they were right on the other side of the door. And it isn’t a very strong door. We put up these flimsy little tables to get people behind and get them under chairs.”
The deceased gunman has been identified as Michael Zehaf-Bibeau by CBS, ABC and CTV and CBC, variously quoting intelligence officials.
Zehaf-Bibeau, a Canadian born in 1982 and who reportedly converted to Islam, has been brought to US agencies’ attentions, according to two American officials. One of the officials said that the man was from Quebec, according to Reuters.
Cirilo was a member of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, a regiment of Reserve Forces based in Hamilton, was training to join the Canada Border Services Agency, his aunt told The Globe and Mail.
Earlier today Ottawa mayor Jim Watson asked that people “Remember how one person’s life has been taken – from his family, from his friends, from the future that was supposed to be his.”
A Facebook page in memory of Cirillo has been set up, and CBS reports that non-uniformed people have been bringing flowers and condolences to the armory in Hamilton.
President Barack Obama has said “we are all shaken” by the Ottawa shooting, which he also called “tragic”.
He said has no information yet about the shooter’s motivations or possible links to a broader network.
Nonetheless, Obama told reporters at the White House that the US and Canada needed to be “in sync” and “vigilant” to confront terrorism; before today’s shooting Canada was reeling from a young man’s attack on two soldiers Monday.
Obama also spoke with Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper earlier today and offered US assistance.
Canadian police have given the name of the dead gunman to the FBI, the New York Times reports:
The Canadian authorities provided FBI agents with the name of the dead Parliament assailant, law enforcement officials in Washington said. A search of FBI databases has so far not come up with anything, they said. They declined to reveal the gunman’s name.
The FBI offered its condolences over Twitter and said it is “ready to assist our partners”.
Though areas are being freed up from lockdown, tense security remains the norm even for people who work on the Hill or downtown. Per the Huffington Post’s Althia Raj:
The shootout in parliament “was clearly right outside our caucus door,” minister Tony Clement told Reuters.
Harper “was addressing caucus, then a huge boom, followed by rat-a-tat shots. We all scattered,” Clement said.
A spokesman for Harper said: “While the prime minister stated that facts are still being gathered, he condemned this despicable attack.”
Parliament’s head of security was involved in shooting the suspect dead, according to Canadian officials and local reports.
Veterans Affairs Minister Julian Fantino, a former policeman, told the Toronto Sun that parliament’s head of security, Sergeant at Arms Kevin Vickers, shot dead a suspected gunman.
“All the details are not in, but the sergeant-at-arms, a former Mountie, is the one that engaged the gunman, or one of them at least, and stopped this,” Fantino said.
Another patient has been brought to Ottawa Civic Hospital, the Citizen’s Elizabeth Payne reports.
She says that in addition to the fatally wounded soldier who arrived at 10.20am, three patients arrived from the area of the shooting, including one with gunshot wounds. The three patients are reportedly stable.
A degree of normalcy is returning to Ottawa, as several buildings near and on Parliament Hill are having lockdowns lifted. People are returning to work and have been let out of areas near parliament, including the cafeteria and Chateau Laurier.
“It lasted like two minutes, I walked out, I take cover, the guy runs in, the shots are fired,” a witness tells my colleague Jessica Glenza.
Marc-André Viau, a senior press a senior parliamentary secretary says that after the gunman ran into Parliament Hill, he heard as many as 10 shots fired, a pause, and another 20 shots fired.
‘It’s surreal because, I mean, I’ve been working on the hill for like six years, um, and I’ve never seen anything close,” said Viau.
“Never had to, in my life, take cover because there was a shooter somewhere,” he said. Viau was sheltering in the food court of a nearby building, when he spoke with the Guardian.
The police chief sticks to his talking points: “what we’ve advised is we’ve asked the public to stay aware from the downtown core, we’re [securing Parliament Hill] and we’re working with the RCMP to clear Parliament Hill, to make sure that’s safe for everybody.
Reporter: “Did [the suspect] have a target in mind?”
Michaud: “Again, it’s way too early to determine a motive.”
Asked about the gunman’s weapon – whether it was a rifle or shotgun – the police chief reiterates that he can only describe the time of 911 calls and police response, not the details of the attack.
Asked slightly differently about whether the shooting took police by surprise, the Michaud says: “If we had known that this was coming we would have been able to disrupt it.”
About the official terror threat level: “The threat level on Parliament Hill is the medium level for the past several years, and that’s the level we’re operating on now.”
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