STORY: The victims were taken to hospital, a police spokesperson told Reuters. At the school, a building had been cordoned off by police. Parents were picking up their children from another school building hundreds of yards away.

The shooting took place at the Viertola school in Vantaa, asuburb of the capital Helsinki, which has around 800 pupils from first to ninth grade and a staff of 90, according to the local municipality.

There are more than 1.5 million licensed firearms and about 430,000 license holders in the nation of 5.6 million people, where hunting and target shooting are popular activities.