During the war, the topic of children’s safety becomes especially acute. Ukrainian children now live in a difficult and tense reality – in conditions of air raids, rocket attacks, attacks by “shaheeds”, evacuations and broken usual life routes. But there is another dangerous front, less obvious, but no less threatening. This is an increase in the risks of the environment in which the children themselves are: schools, yards, teenage companies, where dangerous play with weapons is growing against the background of psychological tension. The event in Lviv became another alarming reminder that during a war, children can be at the epicenter of threats not only from the side of hostilities, but also within the peaceful space. The incident that took place on June 11 in a Lviv school caused a wide response and became a topic for serious reflection: how far teenagers are ready to go in their “experiments”, where they get weapons from and what responsibility adults should bear.
Shooting at a school in Lviv: how it all happened
On June 11, schoolchildren brought an air pistol to school in Lviv. The weapon did not remain hidden in a backpack — teenagers began to test it directly in the classroom, shooting at their classmates. As reported Svitlana Dobrovolska, spokeswoman for the Lviv Oblast Police, said law enforcement officers learned about the event while monitoring social networks, as information about the shooting began to spread on local Telegram channels.
The police promptly responded to the report and immediately began an investigation. Later, the Cyber Police Department clarified: it was possible to establish the school where the incident took place, as well as the persons involved in the shooting. It is about three students of the ninth grade.
Investigators found out that one of the students brought a pneumatic device for shooting metal balls to the school. As it turned out, this gun belonged to his father. By prior agreement, the students tried it in action just in the classroom: the teenager fired a shot in the direction of a friend. Fortunately, there were no injuries or bodily harm. However, the very fact of the presence of weapons in the school environment remains a serious problem.
Psychological aspects: teenage excitement against the background of war
The behavior of Lviv schoolchildren who decided to “test” pneumatic weapons on their classmates is not an accident in modern Ukrainian realities. For the fourth year, children have been living in a country where the topic of war permeates every day: in the news, in the conversations of adults, in the form of shelling and evacuation signals. For teenagers, whose psyche is still forming, the war has become a background that significantly changes their perception of reality, understanding of safety and acceptable limits of behavior.
A separate danger is that military equipment, weapons, military games and military paraphernalia increasingly become an element of everyday perception for children. An air pistol, which in peacetime could be perceived as an unacceptable thing at school, nowadays for some teenagers looks almost like a “toy” or an attribute of adult life that is worth “trying” in the circle of friends.
Legal Liability: What’s Next
Despite the fact that no one was injured during the incident, the situation will not remain without consequences. The police emphasize that an official investigation is underway, and depending on its results, proceedings may be opened. In particular, the question of parental responsibility may arise, since the weapon that the student brought to school belonged to an adult – therefore, there are grounds for checking compliance with the rules for storing such devices at home.
According to Polish and Ukrainian law, pneumatic weapons are considered less dangerous than firearms, but even in this case, their use by minors without supervision is a violation of safety rules. In the school context, such actions can also be considered as a threat to the life and health of other students, which implies disciplinary consequences for the students themselves and their parents.
Schools in Wartime: A New Front for Accountability
The case in Lviv shows how difficult the security situation in Ukrainian schools is during the war. Today, school administrations are forced to constantly think not only about evacuation plans in case of air attacks, but also about internal discipline, control over children’s access to dangerous objects, and the psychological state of students.
Weapons in the hands of teenagers in an educational institution are the result of several problems at once: the general military context, a decrease in sensitivity to the topic of weapons, the lack of strict restrictions on access to pneumatics and insufficient attention of parents to control children.
The war brought a new configuration of dangers to Ukraine, in which the risks for children are not limited to rocket and drone strikes. The situation requires a comprehensive approach: stricter control of weapons in the home, strengthening preventive work in schools, involvement of psychologists in working with teenagers, and a more active position of parents.
Ukrainian children have the right not only to be protected from physical hostilities, but also to a safe school environment where weapons, even pneumatic ones, should never be in the hands of students. Without systematic work at all levels, this danger will only grow.
