Thousands attended a silent rally in the Prague city centre on January 4 for the 14 victims of the shooting spree at the city's Philosophical Faculty on December 21 as more details emerge about the shooter’s weapon arsenal.

Mourners gathered in front of the Karolinum, the main building of Charles University, the country’s oldest university, and in silence marched towards the square in front of the philosophical faculty where a student shooter opened fire in the middle of lectures just ahead of the Christmas holidays.

“Our steps through the streets of Prague today towards the Philosophical Faculty will symbolise also our path towards healing”, Charles University rector Milena Kralickova said in her speech.

Writer and editor at A2 cultural bi-weekly, Matej Metelec, who was at the building on December 21 at the time of the shooting, described the twenty-minute silence at Palach square as “incredibly powerful”.

“More than any speeches. The power of silence”, Metelec told bne Intellinews.   

Several thousands formed a human chain around the building in a symbolic “hug to filda” as the rally was referred to [a hug for the faculty], silently commemorating their colleagues and fellow students who died in the senseless shooting spree which rocked the Czech capital.

Kralickova and the dean of the Philosophical Faculty, Eva Leheckova, lit a fire at the Palach square using candles which have been laid in front of the Karolinum, turning the entrance into a commemoration shrine.

Prague bells rang for fourteen minutes, one minute for each victim, following the lighting of the candles at the square.

Leheckova said the university “is one university community” and that management is “looking into concrete ways how we could return to academic life and how we can renew it as soon as possible at the [faculty’s] main building at the Jan Palach square”.

Palach square itself was named after student Jan Palach, who died of self-immolation in protest against the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia and the ensuing “normalisation” of the country – a euphemism used by Soviet-installed authorities, who imposed a stiff conservative rule in the then communist Czechoslovakia.

The rally was held as media paid increased attention to the country’s lenient gun possession laws and more details emerge about the shooter, whom most Czech media decided not to refer to by name in a show of solidarity with the victims.

Czechia  has a constitutional amendment made to the charter of fundamental rights in 2021 guaranteeing “the right to defend one’s own life or the life of another person with a weapon”.

Czech online news outlet Seznam Zpravy reported earlier this week that there are approximately one million fire arms legally owned by Czechs. On average every gun license holder owns three weapons.

CNN Prime News and MF Dnes reported earlier on January 4 that the shooter took a loan of over CZK1mn (€40,000) to finance the purchase of his weapon arsenal which included eight fire arms.