The world reacts to Sandy Hook school shooting with outpouring of grief (VIDEO)

GlobalPost

The Newtown, Connecticut shooting which claimed 26 lives, including those of 20 young children, has shaken not just the United States, but the world.

An outpouring of grief and sympathy from international leaders have invoked comparisons to other fatal shootings around the world.

In particular, Britons have made comparisons to a 1996 shooting in the small Scottish town of Dunblane which left 16 children dead. That tragedy led to an outcry for tighter gun control laws in the UK: the country made it near-illegal to buy or operate a handgun in Britain, the Associated Press reported

Australia too faced a tragic shooting in 1996, which killed 35 people in Tasmania and also prompted the country to pass tighter gun control legislation. 

Julia Gillard, Australian Prime Minister, called the Sandy Hook shooting a "senseless and incomprehensible act of evil," adding that, "like President Obama and his fellow Americans, our hearts too are broken," according to Australia's Press Association

British CNN host Piers Morgan has also joined the denouncing of the senseless shooting in Connecticut: 

Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron also issued a statement.

"‘My thoughts are with the injured and those who have lost loved ones," said Cameron. "It is heartbreaking to think of those who have had their children robbed from them at such a young age, when they had so much life ahead of them."

More from GlobalPost: Obama, politicians react to Sandy Hook shooting with sadness, questions (VIDEO)

The Queen sent a message to President Obama Friday night saying she was "deeply shocked and saddened" to hear of the shootings, according to the Daily Mail

"Young lives full of hope have been destroyed," said Jose Manuel Barroso, president of the European Union's executive Commission. "On behalf of the European Commission and on my own behalf, I want to express my sincere condolences to the families of the victims of this terrible tragedy."

Also on Friday, China had its own horrifying school attack, in which a man with a knife injured 22 children and one adult at a Central Chinese elementary school.

Over 100,000 Chinese students are students at US schools, and the country expressed a shared sense of grief, the AP reported. 

"Parents with children studying in the US must be tense," Zhang Xin, a wealthy property developer, wrote on her feed on the Twitter-like Sina Weibo service. "School shootings happen often in the US. Can't politicians put away politics and prohibit gun sales?" 

Meanwhile, at the Vatican on Sunday, Pope Benedict XVI expressed his sorrow over the news: 

Sign up for our daily newsletter

Sign up for The Top of the World, delivered to your inbox every weekday morning.