A tragic mass shooting unfolded early Saturday morning near Pretoria, South Africa, when multiple shooters targeted an unlicensed bar, resulting in at least 12 fatalities.

Among those killed were three children, aged three, 12, and 16, highlighting the severity and indiscriminate nature of the attack.

In addition to the deceased, 13 others sustained injuries and are currently receiving medical care at local hospitals. Authorities have yet to release detailed information regarding the ages and conditions of the injured individuals.

The death toll rose after police confirmed that a 12th victim succumbed to their injuries while in hospital care.

The violent incident occurred inside a hostel bar located in the Saulsville township, situated to the west of Pretoria, South Africa’s administrative capital.

According to police reports, 10 individuals lost their lives at the scene, while two more died following hospitalization.

The children killed were a three-year-old boy, a 12-year-old boy and a 16-year-old girl.

Police said they were searching for three male suspects.

“We are told that at least three unknown gunmen entered this hostel where a group of people were drinking and they started randomly shooting,” police spokesperson Brig. Athlenda Mathe told national broadcaster SABC.

She said the motive for the killings was not clear.

The shootings happened about 4.15am, she said, but police were only alerted at 6am.

South Africa has one of the highest homicide rates in the world and recorded more than 26,000 homicides in 2024 — an average of more than 70 a day. Firearms are by far the leading cause of death in homicides.

The country of 62 million people has relatively strict gun ownership laws, but many killings are committed with illegal guns, authorities say.

There have been several mass shootings at bars — sometimes called shebeens or taverns in South Africa — in recent years, including one that killed 16 people in the Johannesburg township of Soweto in 2022.

On the same day, four people were killed in a mass shooting at a bar in another province.

Mathe said that mass shootings at unlicensed bars were becoming a serious problem and police had shut down more than 11,000 illegal taverns between April and September this year and arrested more than 18,000 people for involvement in illegal liquor sales.

Recent mass killings in South Africa have not been confined to bars, however.

Police said 18 people were killed, 15 of them women, in mass shootings minutes apart at two houses on the same road in a rural part of Eastern Cape province in September last year.

Seven men were arrested for those shootings and face multiple charges of murder, while police recovered three AK-style assault rifles they believe were used in the shootings.