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Thailand massacre: ex-cop kills 24 children in knife and gun rampage
NA KLANG, Thailand, Oct 6 (Reuters) – A former policeman killed 34 people, including 23 children, during a knife and gun rampage at a daycare centre in northeast Thailand on Thursday, police said, before later shooting dead his wife and child at home and turning his weapon on himself.
In one of the world’s worst child death tolls in a massacre by a single killer in recent history, most of the children who died at the daycare centre in Uthai Sawan, a town 500 km (310 miles) northeast of Bangkok, were stabbed to death, police said.
The age range of children at the daycare centre was from two to five years, a local official told Reuters.
Police identified the attacker as a former member of the force who was dismissed from his post last year over drug allegations and he was facing trial on a drugs charge.
The man had been in court earlier in the day and had then gone to the daycare centre to collect his child, police spokesperson Paisal Luesomboon told broadcaster ThaiPBS.
When he did not find his child there, he began the killing spree, Paisal said. “He started shooting, slashing, killing children at the Uthai Sawan daycare centre,” Paisal said.
“It’s a scene that nobody wants to see. From the first step when I went in, it felt harrowing,” Piyalak Kingkaew, an experienced emergency worker heading the first responder team, told Reuters.
“We’ve been through it before, but this incident is most harrowing because they are little kids.”
A large van that police said contained bodies of 22 people, mostly children, was seen by Reuters departing from a police station headed towards the city of Udon Thani, 80 km (50 miles) away, where autopsies would be performed.
‘I BEGGED HIM FOR MERCY’
A Reuters photographer also saw late on Thursday the body of the shooter, Panya Khamrapm, being moved in a bodybag from a van to a police station in the province.
Photographs taken at the daycare centre by the rescue team and shared with Reuters showed the tiny bodies of those killed laid out on blankets. Abandoned juice boxes were scattered across the floor.
“He was heading towards me and I begged him for mercy, I didn’t know what to do,” one distraught woman told ThaiPBS, fighting back tears.
“He didn’t say anything, he shot at the door while the kids were sleeping,” another woman said, becoming distraught.
Police said the attacker’s weapon was a 9 mm pistol and it had been obtained legally.
Thailand’s police chief said the perpetrator had tried to break into the premises and had mostly used a knife in the killings.
“Then he got out and started killing anyone he met along the way with a gun or the knife until he got home. We surrounded his house and then found that he committed suicide in his home,” Damrongsak Kittiprapas told reporters.
He said a few children had survived, without giving details.
About 30 children were at the facility – a pink, one-storey building surrounded by a lawn and small palm trees – when the attacker arrived, fewer than usual, as heavy rain had kept many people away, said district official Jidapa Boonsom, who was working in a nearby office at the time.
“The shooter came in around lunch time and shot four or five officials at the childcare centre first,” Jidapa told Reuters.
The attacker forced his way into a locked room where the children were sleeping, Jidapa said. A teacher who was eight months pregnant was also among those stabbed to death, she said.
The massacre is among the worst involving children killed by one person. Anders Breivik killed 69 people, mostly teenagers, at a summer camp in Norway in 2011, while the death toll in other cases include 20 children at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown Connecticut in 2012, 16 at Dunblane in Scotland in 1996 and 19 at a school in Uvalde, Texas, this year.
DRUGS CHARGE
Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-Ocha was expected to visit the region on Friday. In a statement on Facebook, he called Thursday’s rampage a “shocking incident”.
Prayuth ordered all government departments to fly the national flag at half mast on Friday to mark a tragedy that “had caused grief to the entire nation”, his spokesperson Anusha Burapchaisri said.
King Maha Vajiralongkorn and Queen Suthida will visit families of the victims in Udon Thani on Friday, according to a local announcement.
The government said it would provide financial aid to the families to help cover funeral expenses and medical treatment.
The White House and the United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres both expressed shock at the attack and sent condolences to the victims’ families.
Gun laws are strict in Thailand, where possession of an illegal firearm carries a prison sentence of up to 10 years. But ownership is high compared with some other countries in Southeast Asia. Illegal weapons, many brought in from strife-torn neighbouring countries, are common.
Mass shootings in Thailand remain rare, although in 2020, a soldier angry over a property deal gone sour killed at least 29 people and wounded 57 in a rampage that spanned four locations.
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When you’re trying to lose weight, cutting the calories and upping your workouts can go a long way to helping you achieve your goal, but yoga goes one step further. Not only does it help you tone up all over, but yoga also brings your mind and body back into balance, which can improve your relationship with food.
Firstly, try to identify why you’ve gained weight. Sitting or lying on your mat, take a few deep breaths to quieten your mind and soften unnecessary tension in your body. Next, spend 10 minutes doing a yoga breathing technique, such as full yogic breath or alternate nostril breathing, then reflect on the reasons behind your weight gain. Do you eat when stressed, are you confusing thirst for hunger, or maybe you’ve been missing socializing and eating for comfort? Using these techniques calms and balances your system to help you become more aware of your triggers, enabling you to notice the difference between genuine hunger and emotional eating.
Mindful eating
Research in the journal Evidence-based Complementary and Alternative Medicine found that yoga practitioners in the study had ‘less stress eating, reduced appetite, fewer cravings and a shift toward healthier, more mindful eating. Try a few rounds of yogic breathing before eating, when preparing meals or planning the week’s menu – it can be a powerful way to retune established eating patterns and give you the mental space to care for your deeper needs, instead of finding temporary satisfaction with food.
Yoga to suit you
Find a yoga style that meets your needs, personality, and weight-loss goals. Do you prefer a high-energy class that leaves you breathless and sweaty, or would you prefer a more relaxing yoga class? Whatever you prefer, yoga can help you tone up and lose weight. Here are three yoga styles to get you started…
Astanga – the muscle builder
A strong yoga practice such as Astanga actively contributes toward weight loss by building lean muscle mass. The good news for dieters is as muscle burns more calories than fat– both during and after your workout. Ashtanga is a challenging style of yoga based on vinyasas (where you flow from one posture to the next without a break) – the most familiar being the upper body and core strengthener plank, to low plank (chaturanga), to upward dog, to downward dog. There are six sets of sequences, known as ‘series’ and you learn them in sequential order.
Hot yoga – the calorie burner
The most famous hot yoga style, Bikram, can burn between 500 to 1000 calories in a 90-minute class, and studies show its higher temperatures (up to 40C) reduces body fat percentage more than yoga at normal temperatures. Bikram classes focus on 26 postures (no downward dog or headstand), but if you want to do more poses and still see the weight-loss benefits of practicing in higher temperatures, there are other styles to explore – you can try Hot Power Yoga or Baptiste Power Yoga.
Restorative – the stress buster
Feeling under pressure? Your body shape will tell the tale. Unused cortisol, a by-product of long-term stress with no outlet, is stored as visceral or abdominal fat around your belly. Calming practices, such as restorative yoga – where you deeply relax your nervous system by resting in seated or lying postures supported by bolsters and blocks – can help reduce cortisol levels and weight around your middle. In one study, participants doing restorative yoga lost more than 2.5 times the amount of subcutaneous fat (fat visible just under the skin) compared to a control group.
Odyssey has been the lead content writer and content marketer. He has vast experience in the field of writing. His SEO strategies help businesses to gain maximum traffic and success.
