Five people have been killed in a shooting in northern Switzerland.

The incident took place in the Swiss canton Aargau, between the cities of Zurich and Bern.

Officers responding to reports of shots found “several” bodies in and around a residential building in Wuerenlingen, a community of roughly 4500 people north-west of Zurich, late on Saturday (local time), police said in a statement.

The dead include the suspected gunman, who is believed to have killed himself, Aargau canton police chief Michael Leupold told a news conference on Sunday.

He said the information investigators have suggests a domestic dispute was behind the shooting.

He said the shooter was a 36-year-old Swiss national but did not reveal his identity.

Local media reports described the shooter as a policeman and father of three.

The man did not have a gun licence and did not fire with a police weapon, a police spokesman said.

The shooter first went to a house and killed a 58-year-old man, his 57-year-old wife and a 32-year-old man. The older couple were his parents-in-law and the younger man was his brother-in-law, police said.

The man then went to another house and shot dead a 46-year-old man before turning the gun on himself.

The latest shooting, which follows similar incidents in January and November, sent shock waves through the nation.

– with agencies