CAMBODIA: A Cambodian man who shot dead a Canadian toddler during a school hostage drama near Angkor Wat was driven by revenge against his South Korean former employer, police said yesterday.
Chea Khom quit last week as driver for a Korean restaurant owner in Siem Reap, gateway to the famed 800-year-old temples, after being slapped in the face for taking the children to school late, senior police investigator Ou Em said.
He then decided to exact revenge by kidnapping the Korean's children from the school, hatching a plot with friends in Phnom Penh which led ultimately to Thursday's school siege and the death of the two-year-old Canadian boy, he said.
"When he entered the school his first target was to kidnap the Korean children, but when he saw the parents of the children he was afraid to do it," Mr Ou Em told reporters. "So he turned to another classroom and took them hostage."
Armed with knives and a handgun, the four hostage-takers, all in their 20s, first demanded $1,000 (€815) and a van in return for the release of the 29 infants in the class. Later they increased the sum to $30,000 (€24,450), police said.
When negotiators stalled over the demand for weapons, Chea Khom and his accomplices started to lose their cool.
"The gunmen demanded we give them money, a van and grenades. We did not agree to give them grenades and guns, so they got mad and shot the kid in the head," he told reporters.
After an eight-hour standoff, police and soldiers stormed the school compound.
Mr Ou Em said the four, who were paraded battered and bruised before reporters at Siem Reap police station, 200km (125 miles) northwest of the capital, would be sent to court on Saturday morning to be charged with robbery and kidnap.
Police said they had arrested a guard who had acted as the "mastermind", although he did not take part in the attack.