According to police authorities, a student opened fire at a university in the Russian city of Perm on Monday, killing at least eight people and injuring several others.

According to Natalia Pechishcheva, a university spokesman, the gunman was killed after the shootings at Perm State University, around 1,300 kilometers (800 miles) east of Moscow.

She stated, “He was liquidated.” His prone body was seen on the ground outdoors in footage from the scene.

Students jumped from first-floor windows to leave the building, landing heavily on the ground before racing to safety, according to earlier media footage from the incident.

According to the students, they constructed barricades out of chairs to prevent the shooter from accessing their classrooms.

The gunman was recognized as a university student, according to the Investigative Committee, which handles significant criminal investigations.

“In the classroom, there were roughly 60 people. We barricaded the entrance with chairs and closed it “Semyon Karyakin, a student, told Reuters.

The gunman was identified by local media as an 18-year-old student who had previously shared a social media photo of himself holding a weapon, helmet, and ammunition.

“I’ve thought about this for a long time, it’s been years and I realised the time had come to do what I dreamt of,” he said on a social media account attributed to him that was later taken down.

He indicated his actions had nothing to do with politics or religion but were motivated by hatred.

Russia has strict restrictions on civilian firearm ownership, but some categories of guns are available for purchase for hunting, self-defence or sport, once would-be owners have passed tests and met other requirements.

The shootings were the latest in a series.

Earlier this year a lone teenage gunman opened fire at a school in the city of Kazan in May, killing nine people and wounding many more.

That was Russia’s deadliest school shooting since 2018 when a student at a college in Russian-annexed Crimea killed 20 people before turning his gun on himself.

Russia raised the legal age for buying firearms from 18 to 21 after the Kazan shooting, but the new law has yet to come into force.