Officials have said a Russian soldier had opened fire on fellow troops at a Siberian military base, killing eight and wounding another two.
The incident took place at a military base in the Chita region in eastern Siberia on Friday.
They blamed the attack on a possible “nervous breakdown.”
“The serviceman who opened fire has been detained,” the ministry said in a statement, quoted by Russian news agencies.
“The actions of the serviceman could be the result of a nervous breakdown caused by personal circumstances not connected to his military duty,” the defense ministry said, citing preliminary information.
The ministry said the wounded were hospitalized and that their injuries were not life-threatening.
A commission chaired by Deputy Defense Minister Andrei Kartapolov was on its way to the base.
A defense ministry spokesman declined to immediately comment when reached by AFP.
Brutal hazing rituals were a major problem in the Russian army in the 1990s but this has significantly improved in recent years.
