Police probed e-mails, examined mobile phone messages and investigated reports of a playground dispute yesterday in a search for the motive behind the killing of a 12-year-old girl with a box-cutter by a classmate in southern Japan.
Shocked education officials, meanwhile, called for teachers to review school curriculums emphasizing compassion and res-pect for human life in their classrooms.
"It is a terrible pity that an incident like this occurred within school grounds. I would like to ask you all to once again take extra measures to ensure an incident like this never happens again," said Yasunao Seki, an official at the Education Ministry, speaking at a meeting convened yesterday for school authorities.
On Tuesday, the 11-year-old killer led Satomi Mitarai to an empty classroom during lunch hour, slit her neck and arms and left her to bleed to death.
Mitarai's bleeding body was discovered in a third-floor classroom by a teacher after the suspect reportedly returned smeared in blood.
Police were investigating the possibility that the killing stemmed from a dispute the two girls had over the Internet.
Media reports told the story of a friendship between two classmates -- who regularly left notes on each other's home pages and used text messaging -- suddenly going awry.
The daily Asahi Shimbun's Web site quoted the suspect as telling investigators that, "I didn't think what she wrote on the home page was funny, so I called her out [of the classroom]. I meant to kill her."
Other students allegedly recalled the two girls fighting during a recent school sporting event, Nippon Television Network reported.
A Nagasaki police spokesman said the leads were being "resolved" but refused to elaborate.
The suspect was in police custody and she was expected to be transferred to juvenile detention while her case goes to family court.
Police did not release her name, according to Japanese legal protections for juvenile offenders.
Parents, teachers and students shaken by the tragedy grieved at Okubo Elementary School, in Sasebo, 980km southwest of Tokyo, at a special assembly.
"We are still extremely shocked," Junichiro Kamogawa, Sasebo city board of education official, said. "We're worried about how to take care of children who were traumatized by it."
The grisly murder has appalled Japan, where a dramatic spike in juvenile delinquency and school violence over the past decade has shaken deeply held beliefs that the country is largely immune to the violence of Europe and the US.
A beauty queen who pulled out of the Miss South Africa competition when her nationality was questioned has said she wants to relocate to Nigeria, after coming second in the Miss Universe pageant while representing the West African country. Chidimma Adetshina, whose father is Nigerian, was crowned Miss Universe Africa and Oceania and was runner-up to Denmark’s Victoria Kjar Theilvig in Mexico on Saturday night. The 23-year-old law student withdrew from the Miss South Africa competition in August, saying that she needed to protect herself and her family after the government alleged that her mother had stolen the identity of a South
BELT-TIGHTENING: Chinese investments in Cambodia are projected to drop to US$35 million in 2026 from more than US$420 million in 2021 At a ceremony in August, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet knelt to receive blessings from saffron-robed monks as fireworks and balloons heralded the breaking of ground for a canal he hoped would transform his country’s economic fortunes. Addressing hundreds of people waving the Cambodian flag, Hun Manet said China would contribute 49 percent to the funding of the Funan Techo Canal that would link the Mekong River to the Gulf of Thailand and reduce Cambodia’s shipping reliance on Vietnam. Cambodia’s government estimates the strategic, if contentious, infrastructure project would cost US$1.7 billion, nearly 4 percent of the nation’s annual GDP. However, months later,
HOPEFUL FOR PEACE: Zelenskiy said that the war would ‘end sooner’ with Trump and that Ukraine must do all it can to ensure the fighting ends next year Russia’s state-owned gas company Gazprom early yesterday suspended gas deliveries via Ukraine, Vienna-based utility OMV said, in a development that signals a fast-approaching end of Moscow’s last gas flows to Europe. Russia’s oldest gas-export route to Europe, a pipeline dating back to Soviet days via Ukraine, is set to shut at the end of this year. Ukraine has said it would not extend the transit agreement with Russian state-owned Gazprom to deprive Russia of profits that Kyiv says help to finance the war against it. Moscow’s suspension of gas for Austria, the main receiver of gas via Ukraine, means Russia now only
‘HARD-HEADED’: Some people did not evacuate to protect their property or because they were skeptical of the warnings, a disaster agency official said Typhoon Man-yi yesterday slammed into the Philippines’ most populous island, with the national weather service warning of flooding, landslides and huge waves as the storm sweeps across the archipelago nation. Man-yi was still packing maximum sustained winds of 185kph after making its first landfall late on Saturday on lightly populated Catanduanes island. More than 1.2 million people fled their homes ahead of Man-yi as the weather forecaster warned of a “life-threatening” effect from the powerful storm, which follows an unusual streak of violent weather. Man-yi uprooted trees, brought down power lines and smashed flimsy houses to pieces after hitting Catanduanes in the typhoon-prone
RSS