Eight South Korean soldiers were killed and two others were seriously injured yesterday when a soldier went on a shooting rampage near the tense inter-Korean border, the defense ministry said.
The man, identified as Private First Class Kim, 22, threw a grenade and fired from his rifle into an army barracks where his colleagues were sleeping in northeastern Yeoncheon early yesterday, the ministry said.
Kim, under investigation after turning himself in, said he went on the shooting spree in a fit of rage because his senior colleagues had bullied him, according to the ministry.
PHOTO: AFP
"Eight soldiers were killed and two others were seriously injured in the incident involving a grenade and a rifle at a guard post at 2:30am Sunday," the ministry said in a statement.
Twenty-five soldiers in their 20s were sleeping in the barracks at the time.
As well as the hand grenade, Kim used about 40 rounds of ammunition, leaving platoon leader Lieutenant Kim Jong-myung and seven other enlisted soldiers dead.
Two others who suffered shot wounds to their legs were immediately airlifted to a nearby hospital to undergo surgery. They were in serious but not critical condition.
Defense Minister Yoon Kwang-woong apologized for the shooting rampage, which he was told by President Roh Moo-hyun to thoroughly investigate in order to prevent such an incident from happening again.
"As a minister in charge of national defense, I lower my head and make a sincere apology for the incident," Yoon told a televised news conference.
"I express deep condolences to the soldiers and their bereaved family members. We will take through follow-up measures to prevent a similar incident from happening."
President Roh Moo-hyun earlier told Yoon over the phone: "It is very regrettable ... Look into the cause of the incident and take all the steps to prevent its recurrence."
Ministry officials refrained from commenting on the cause of the tragedy which they said was still under scrutiny, however they largely blamed it on stress in military life.
The attacker turned himself in shortly after the incident at Yeoncheon, 62km north of Seoul, which is just next to the tense military border with North Korea.
"He got into a temper following verbal abuse by his senior soldiers. Details are still under investigation," Brigadier General Jang Seok-kyu, army spokesman, told a news conference. Kim was not found to have any history of mental illness, Jang added.
The incident happened at a small guard post near the inter-Korean border, known as the Demilitarized Zone, that has separated the communist North and capitalist South for five decades.
Every South Korean man serves two years of mandatory military service.
Japan has deployed long-range missiles in a southwestern region near China, the Japanese defense minister said yesterday, at a time when ties with Beijing are at their lowest in recent years. The missiles were installed in Kumamoto in the southern region of Kyushu, as Japan is attempting to shore up its military capacity as China steps up naval activity in the East China Sea. “Standoff defense capabilities enable us to counter the threat of enemy forces attempting to invade our country ... while ensuring the safety of our personnel,” Japanese Minister of Defense Shinjiro Koizumi said. “This is an extremely important initiative for
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) today accepted an invitation from Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to lead a delegation to China next month, saying she hopes to promote the peaceful development of cross-strait relations and bring stability to the Taiwan Strait. “I am grateful and happy to accept this invitation,” Cheng said in a statement from the KMT chairperson’s office. Cheng said she hopes both sides can work together to promote the peaceful development of cross-strait relations, enhance exchange and cooperation, bring stability to the Taiwan Strait and improve people’s livelihoods. At today's news conference, Cheng said any efforts to
MORE POPULAR: Taiwan Pass sales increased by 59 percent during the first quarter compared with the same period last year, the Tourism Administration said The Tourism Administration yesterday said that it has streamlined the Taiwan Pass, with two versions available for purchase beginning today. The tourism agency has made the pass available to international tourists since 2024, allowing them to access the high-speed rail, Taiwan Railway Corp services, four MRT systems and four Taiwan Tourist Shuttles. Previously, five types of Taiwan Pass were available, but some tourists have said that the offerings were too complicated. The agency said only two types of Taiwan Pass would be available, starting from a three-day pass with the high-speed rail and a three-day pass with Taiwan Railway Corp. The former costs NT$2,800
The nation’s fastest supercomputer, Nano 4 (晶創26), is scheduled to be launched in the third quarter, and would be used to train large language models in finance and national defense sectors, the National Center for High-Performance Computing (NCHC) said. The supercomputer, which would operate at about 86.05 petaflops, is being tested at a new cloud computing center in the Southern Taiwan Science Park in Tainan. The exterior of the server cabinet features chip circuitry patterns overlaid with a map of Taiwan, highlighting the nation’s central position in the semiconductor industry. The center also houses Taiwania 2, Taiwania 3, Forerunner 1 and
RSS