A woman and two policemen have been killed in a shooting and stabbing attack at a farm in central Japan. According to the news of the foreign news agency AFP, these details related to the incident were provided by the police.
According to police and media reports, the suspect, believed to be a farmer in his 30s, was hiding inside a building after the incident in which a fourth person was also injured.
Kyodo News reported that the suspect’s mother escaped from the building where he was hiding.
Authorities urged people to stay indoors in the semi-rural area around the city of Nakano in the Nagano region where the attack took place.
This is a rare example of violent crime in Japan, which has a low homicide rate and some of the world’s strictest gun laws.
Public broadcaster NHA and other major media outlets said the woman was stabbed and two police officers were shot in the afternoon attack.
The dead officers were identified as Yoshiki Tamai, 46, and Taku Ikeuchi, 61, a Nagano police spokesman told AFP.
A police spokesperson said that the deceased woman was in her 40s or 50s.
He added that two more women also escaped from the house where the suspect was hiding.
A witness told NHK that he called emergency services, NHK quoted police as saying that the assailant then fired what appeared to be a shotgun at police officers who arrived at the scene.
While the officers were inside the car, the assailant placed the weapon against the vehicle’s window and fired twice, the report said.
Another person was injured in the attack but could not be rescued because the victim was too close to the building where the suspect was hiding, Kyodo News said.
Japan was rocked last July when former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was shot dead in broad daylight with what appeared to be a homemade gun.
Shinzo Abe’s accused killer allegedly targeted the politician based on his links to the Unification Church.
And last month, a man was arrested for allegedly throwing a pipe bomb-like explosive device at the prime minister while he was campaigning in the western city of Wakayama.
The local court said this week that the prime minister was not harmed and that the person arrested at the scene will undergo a psychiatric examination for three months.
The suspect was reportedly tight-lipped about his motive for the botched attack.
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2024-08-16 20:48:36
