December 13, 2023

School Shooting Shakes Bryansk


School Shooting Shakes Bryansk
Bryansk City Center
Pavel Demin

On December 7, 9-a.m. classes at the Nº 5 Gymnasium in Bryansk were interrupted by gunshots. A fourteen-year-old student entered a biology classroom with a gun, killing a student and injuring 5. Then she killed herself.

Alina Afanaskina's father, a boxer and hunter who worked at a private security firm, owned a rifle kept under lock and key. It is believed that Alina took her father's gun the day before the attack during his birthday celebration. Afanaskina hid the weapon and a hunting knife among art supplies and went to school with her twin sister Daria. The security guard on duty at the Nº 5 Gymnasium, Galina Chertkova, did not suspect anything was out of the ordinary with the eighth-grader. The school metal detectors were not working.

During the second period, Alina entered her biology class and immediately began shooting. The teacher in charge, Ofelya Mkrtchyan, tried to convince her to stop as students hid under their desks. A 13-year-old was shot and died on the way to the hospital. Two of the wounded were carried by plane to Moscow. Alina Afanaskina shot herself. Her twin sister was unharmed.

Authorities have not concluded what the motive was for the shooting. Among Alina's belongings, there was ammunition and a notebook with a note that read, "You must definitely meet with a friend." A former student at the gymnasium said Alina was being bullied. The Executive Director of the National Center for Children's Assistance, Ekaterina Mizulina, claims that Afanaskina had a conflict with the dead victim over a boy.

The police have detained the head of the security company in charge of the gymnasium, the security guard on duty, and the schoolgirl's father. 

Residents have left stuffed animals and flowers on the Gymnasium gate. School authorities have not announced when the school will reopen.

You Might Also Like

Integration through Education?
  • October 08, 2023

Integration through Education?

Russian President Putin stressed the importance of education in regions newly annexed from Ukraine. But is there a more sinister motive at play?
From Trenches to Schools
  • September 18, 2023

From Trenches to Schools

Russian soldiers returned from the war in Ukraine will give new practical courses on security and defense for schoolchildren.
Like this post? Get a weekly email digest + member-only deals

Some of Our Books

Marooned in Moscow

Marooned in Moscow

This gripping autobiography plays out against the backdrop of Russia's bloody Civil War, and was one of the first Western eyewitness accounts of life in post-revolutionary Russia. Marooned in Moscow provides a fascinating account of one woman's entry into war-torn Russia in early 1920, first-person impressions of many in the top Soviet leadership, and accounts of the author's increasingly dangerous work as a journalist and spy, to say nothing of her work on behalf of prisoners, her two arrests, and her eventual ten-month-long imprisonment, including in the infamous Lubyanka prison. It is a veritable encyclopedia of life in Russia in the early 1920s.
A Taste of Chekhov

A Taste of Chekhov

This compact volume is an introduction to the works of Chekhov the master storyteller, via nine stories spanning the last twenty years of his life.
Dostoyevsky Bilingual

Dostoyevsky Bilingual

Bilingual series of short, lesser known, but highly significant works that show the traditional view of Dostoyevsky as a dour, intense, philosophical writer to be unnecessarily one-sided. 
The Samovar Murders

The Samovar Murders

The murder of a poet is always more than a murder. When a famous writer is brutally stabbed on the campus of Moscow’s Lumumba University, the son of a recently deposed African president confesses, and the case assumes political implications that no one wants any part of.
Turgenev Bilingual

Turgenev Bilingual

A sampling of Ivan Turgenev's masterful short stories, plays, novellas and novels. Bilingual, with English and accented Russian texts running side by side on adjoining pages.
Stargorod: A Novel in Many Voices

Stargorod: A Novel in Many Voices

Stargorod is a mid-sized provincial city that exists only in Russian metaphorical space. It has its roots in Gogol, and Ilf and Petrov, and is a place far from Moscow, but close to Russian hearts. It is a place of mystery and normality, of provincial innocence and Black Earth wisdom. Strange, inexplicable things happen in Stargorod. So do good things. And bad things. A lot like life everywhere, one might say. Only with a heavy dose of vodka, longing and mystery.
Survival Russian

Survival Russian

Survival Russian is an intensely practical guide to conversational, colloquial and culture-rich Russian. It uses humor, current events and thematically-driven essays to deepen readers’ understanding of Russian language and culture. This enlarged Second Edition of Survival Russian includes over 90 essays and illuminates over 2000 invaluable Russian phrases and words.
The Little Humpbacked Horse (bilingual)

The Little Humpbacked Horse (bilingual)

A beloved Russian classic about a resourceful Russian peasant, Vanya, and his miracle-working horse, who together undergo various trials, exploits and adventures at the whim of a laughable tsar, told in rich, narrative poetry.
Tolstoy Bilingual

Tolstoy Bilingual

This compact, yet surprisingly broad look at the life and work of Tolstoy spans from one of his earliest stories to one of his last, looking at works that made him famous and others that made him notorious. 
Woe From Wit (bilingual)

Woe From Wit (bilingual)

One of the most famous works of Russian literature, the four-act comedy in verse Woe from Wit skewers staid, nineteenth century Russian society, and it positively teems with “winged phrases” that are essential colloquialisms for students of Russian and Russian culture.
The Latchkey Murders

The Latchkey Murders

Senior Lieutenant Pavel Matyushkin is back on the case in this prequel to the popular mystery Murder at the Dacha, in which a serial killer is on the loose in Khrushchev’s Moscow...

About Us

Russian Life is a publication of a 30-year-young, award-winning publishing house that creates a bimonthly magazine, books, maps, and other products for Russophiles the world over.

Latest Posts

Our Contacts

Russian Life
73 Main Street, Suite 402
Montpelier VT 05602

802-223-4955