Just in: In assassination attempt, Slovakia’s Prime Minister shot multiple times

Just in: In assassination attempt, Slovakia’s Prime Minister shot multiple times 

Robert Fico, Slovakia’s prime minister, has been taken to hospital in a “life-threatening condition” after he was shot multiple times on Wednesday.

According to his official social media account, the 59-year-old leader was hit in the abdomen outside the House of Culture in the town of Handlova.

Police have detained a suspect. There was no immediate information on the motive.

Reuters reported Zuzana Caputova, President of Slovakia, as condemning the “brutal and ruthless” attack on Fico.

She said in a televised statement, “A physical attack on the prime minister is, first of all, an attack on a person, but it is also an attack on democracy.”

The Russian ambassador to Slovakia Igor Bratchikov also condemned the shooting of Fico.

“I strongly condemn this act of violence and express my conviction of the necessity of punishment for the perpetrators,” Bratchikov said in a letter to Fico that the Russian embassy shared on its Facebook page.

Fico, a third-time premier with the left-wing Smer (Direction) party, won Slovakia’s September 30 parliamentary elections, staging a political comeback after campaigning on a pro-Russian and anti-American message.