A major terror alert is ongoing in the Canadian capital Ottawa, with a gunman or possibly gunmen apparently on the loose in the Canadian parliament.<br /><br />Shots were fired inside the parliament after a gunman was chased by police into its central block, in downtown Ottawa. It came after a Canadian soldier was shot and wounded at a war memorial nearby.<br /><br />CBC TV has reported that a suspected gunman has been shot and killed inside the parliament buildings.<br /><br />There have also been reports of a shooting at a shopping centre. The whole of downtown Ottawa is reported to be on lockdown.<br /><br />At least one Member of Parliament has also reported that the gunman has been shot by police.<br /><br />“Gunman at Parliament’s Centre Block has been shot and killed,” said Conservative MP Bernard Trottier on Twitter. <br /><br />The report has not been officially confirmed.<br /><br />“We are actively looking for suspects right now, so we don’t know if it is suspect one or suspects plural,” Ottawa Police Constable Marc Soucy told Reuters.<br /><br />Some 30 more shots were fired inside the building, according to witnesses.<br /><br />Parliament has been locked down and Prime Minister Stephen Harper has left the building.<br /><br />There have been conflicting reports about the shots fired at parliament.<br /><br />Earlier a Canadian soldier was shot at the National War Memorial in Ottawa.<br /><br />The soldier was wounded and has been taken to hospital.<br /><br />The Canadian military has closed its bases to the public across the country, according to CBC TV. <br /><br />Before Wednesday’s events, Canada raised its terrorism threat level to medium from low following a deadly attack on two soldiers in Quebec on Monday.<br /><br />It was the first fatal attack on Canadian soil linked to Islamist militants and comes as six fighter jets left to join the fight against ISIL extremists in Iraq.<br /><br />Earlier this month Canada announced plans to join the US-led campaign of air strikes. <br /><br /> (function(d, s, id) {var js,ijs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(d.getElementById(id))return;js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=”//embed.scribblelive.com/widgets/embed.js”;ijs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, ijs);}(document, ‘script’, ‘scrbbl-js’));
