Numerous children injured by vehicle at school gate in central China
Taipei (AP): Numerous children were injured by a vehicle at the gate of an elementary school in central China's Hunan province on Tuesday morning, reports said.
Students were arriving for classes around 8 am at Yong'an Elementary School in the city of Changde when the incident occurred.
Few details were immediately available, and it wasn't clear whether the vehicle had lost control or whether it was a deliberate attack.
The official Xinhua News Agency said sacceveral adults were also injured and identified the vehicle as a small white SUV. It said the driver was subdued by parents and security guards, and some of the injured were sent to the hospital immediately, with the total casualty count still unknown.
Footage posted on Chinese social media showed the injured lying on the road while terrified students ran past the gate and inside the schoolhouse.
Comments on Chinese internet sites reflected anger and frustration with recurring incidents of violence against citizens by those venting anger at society.
“No matter what the reason is, innocent children should not be harmed,” said one comment on the popular Weibo social media site. “Timely resolve conflicts, prevent such incidents and severely punish the perpetrators,” said another.
While China has much lower rates of violence than many countries — personal gun ownership there is illegal — knifings and the use of homemade explosives still occur.
Chinese schools have been subject to numerous attacks by people armed with knives or using vehicles as weapons.
A stabbing attack at a vocational school in the eastern Chinese city of Wuxi on Saturday left eight people dead and 17 others injured.
That came shortly after a man drove his car into people at a sports facility in the southern city of Zhuhai, leaving 35 people dead and 43 others injured.
In September, three people were killed in a knife attack in a Shanghai supermarket, and 15 others were injured. Police said at the time that the suspect had personal financial disputes and came to Shanghai to “vent his anger.”
The same month, a Japanese schoolboy died after being stabbed on his way to school in the southern city of Shenzhen.
The Chinese government generally censors internet content it deems overly sensitive or political, and some images of the school incident were quickly taken down.
Most Western social media sites and search engines like Google are blocked in China, limiting available content even while some people use tools like VPNs and send news through Chinese social media before the censors have time to catch it.
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Three company directors held in Rs 100-crore investment fraud in Kochi
Kochi (Kerala) (PTI): Police on Sunday arrested three directors of a firm accused of cheating hundreds of investors of over Rs 100 crore through a fake investment scheme linked to agricultural tourism here, officials said.
The accused were identified as Muraleedharan, Ashik Murali and Akhil Murali, all natives of Thrissur.
The arrests were made by the Kalamassery police in connection with a fraud involving ATCOS (Agri Tourism Cooperative Society), a firm headquartered at Pathadipalam here.
Police said the company had promised high returns by collecting investments from the public in the agricultural tourism sector, but allegedly cheated hundreds of people and fled with the money.
ATCOS was registered under the Multi-State Cooperative Societies Act and operated 13 branches across various districts in Kerala, besides a branch in Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu, officials said.
When investors failed to receive their promised returns or the invested amount, complaints were filed with the police.
Officials said around 54 cases have been registered against the firm in 32 police stations across the state, including 29 cases at the Kalamassery police station alone.
Following instructions from Kochi City Police Commissioner K S Mahesh Kumar, a special investigation team was formed under the supervision of Deputy Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) Shehensha and Thrikkakara ACP Manoj Kumar.
The team traced the accused to an apartment in Amala Nagar in Thrissur, where they had been hiding after secretly renting the flat, officials said.
The bank accounts of the accused have been frozen, and steps have been initiated to trace their assets, officials said.
Police also conducted a raid at the company’s office at Pathadipalam and seized several documents related to the case.
The accused were produced before the Judicial First Class Magistrate Court in Kalamassery, which remanded them to judicial custody and sent them to Kakkanad jail.
Police said they would seek the custody of the accused for further interrogation as the investigation continues.
