China: Man killed 19 after ‘conflict with parents’

By Mahmut Atanur

BEIJING

Chinese police said Friday that a man arrested in relation to the deaths of 19 people in a southwestern village confessed to having killed the victims after a “conflict with his parents”.

State news agency Xinhua cited police in southwest Yunnan Province as saying that the suspect Yang Qingpei, born in 1989, tried asking his parents for money Wednesday when a fight broke out in Yema village of Huize County.

He then allegedly killed his parents and then 17 neighbors -- including three children -- out of fear that “he would be discovered by community members”.

Police arrested him Thursday following his return to the provincial capital of Kunming, where he is employed.

An investigation by the Ministry of Public Security is ongoing.