Man in China sentenced to death for stabbing death of Japanese boy: Report

TOKYO: A Chinese court has sentenced a man to death over the fatal stabbing of a Japanese boy in the southern city of Shenzhen, Japan's Kyodo news agency said on Friday (Jan 24), citing Japanese ambassador to China, Kenji Kanasugi.

The trial started earlier in the day.

The boy, a 10-year-old Japanese national born to a Japanese father and a Chinese mother, was stabbed on his way to school on a morning in September last year. He died the following day.

The assailant, identified by Chinese authorities as a 44-year-old man surnamed Zhong, was formally arrested on Nov 30 on suspicion of murder, Kyodo had reported.

The attack took place on the anniversary of an incident in 1931 that triggered war between China and Japan, a sensitive date at a time when diplomatic relations are in danger of deteriorating.

Kyodo said on Friday Chinese authorities described the case as an accidental and isolated incident, without giving motives.

It was second such incident near Japanese educational centres in China last year, after another in June in which a man attacked a bus used by a Japanese school in the eastern city of Suzhou, resulting in the death of a Chinese national who tried to shield a Japanese mother and her child from the assailant.

A court in Suzhou sentenced that assailant to death on Thursday, Kyodo reported.