(Bangkok) A former police officer armed with a gun and a knife killed at least 35 people on Thursday, including 23 children from a daycare center in Thailand, one of the worst massacres the kingdom has known – before killing his family and commit suicide.
Posted at 6:17 a.m.
Updated at 6:28 a.m.
Jakkapat Vijitraithaya, police colonel in Nong Bua Lamphu province, told AFP that 12 people were also injured, three of them seriously.
The country’s Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha has ordered an investigation into the “horrible” massacre, he wrote on his Facebook account.
The 34-year-old shooter, armed with a rifle, pistol and knife, opened fire at a daycare center in Na Klang, in the north of the country, around 12:30 p.m. local time, a local official said. Colonel of the Nong Bua Lamphu Province Police.
He then fled by car, knocking down several passers-by, described Jakkapat Vijitraithaya, before killing his wife and their child. The massacre ended when he took his own life.
Among the victims are 23 children between the ages of 2 and 3, Jakkapat said.
The shooter, Panya Khamrab, was sacked from his post as lieutenant colonel last year due to a drug problem.
“He tried to hit other people on the road. He hit a motorcycle and two people were injured. I hurried away,” a witness, Paweena Purichan, 31, who was riding a motorbike to her shop, told AFP. “There was blood everywhere,” she said.
Twenty-nine deaths in 2020
A first report from the authorities reported “20 dead at least” and several injured, before gradually increasing.
Thailand is one of the countries in the world with the largest number of weapons in circulation.
A shooting perpetrated by an army officer occurred in February 2020 in Thailand at a shopping center in Nakhon Ratchasima, killing 29 people.
The shooter, a 31-year-old chief warrant officer, was shot dead by law enforcement after his murderous spree lasting almost 17 hours. He had acted out after an argument with a superior.
“This is unprecedented in Thailand and I want this to be the last time such a crisis occurs,” Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha, still in office, said at the time.
A royal army sergeant major was also behind a shooting at a military site in Bangkok in September, killing two officers.
“I am shocked by the horrific events in Thailand. My thoughts are with those affected and the rescuers,” British Prime Minister Liz Truss tweeted.