A Polish army soldier opened fire in a public place in the village of Melnik, a few kilometers from the border with Belarus; there are no reports of casualties. This was reported to the Polsat television channel by Tomasz Krupa, a representative of the Podlaskie Voivodeship police.
“We were informed about this information by phone from the emergency services at around 3:30 p.m. The message shows that the man opened fire in a public place”, the police officer said. The serviceman, who was intoxicated, was detained by the military gendarmerie officers who arrived at the scene, he added.
According to the operational command of the Polish Armed Forces, the culprit of the incident turned out to be a soldier from the 18th mechanized division, whose tasks include assisting the border service in protecting the border. A serviceman with a service weapon left the field camp without permission, then fired at a civilian car, the command noted. Before being detained, the serviceman was hiding in a nearby forest. The operational command confirmed that, according to preliminary data, the soldier was drunk.