Police in South Africa say 15 people were killed and another nine injured in a shooting at a tavern in Soweto, while four died in an apparently unrelated attack in another bar in Pietermaritzburg

The gunmen killed 15 people in South Africa’s Soweto township in the early hours of Sunday (July 10) morning after entering a bar and “shooting randomly at the patrons.”

Police say nine people were also injured in the attack at the Orlando East tavern on the outskirts of Johannesburg in Gauteng province.

Faith Mazibuko is a member of Gauteng’s executive council.

“The type of the rifles that were used, which is the AK-47, really, really does injure a person in such a way that that person sometimes, it never becomes easy for them to actually survive.”

Gauteng’s police commissioner Elias Mawela said no specific person had been targeted and that you could tell the assailants had fired randomly from the way bullet cartridges were scattered around.

Police have also confirmed a second apparently random shooting on Saturday (July 9) evening in a tavern in Pietermaritzburg where four people were killed and eight injured.

That took place around 300 miles from Soweto and police said there was no suspicion that the incidents were linked.

South Africa is one of the world’s most violent countries with 20,000 people murdered each year, one of the highest per capita murder rates globally.

Reuters