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Japan knife attack: 19 killed at care centre in Sagamihara | |
(35 minutes later) | |
Nineteen people have been killed in a knife attack at a care centre for people with mental disabilities in Japan, officials say. | |
The attack in Sagamihara, west of Tokyo, happened in the early hours of Tuesday. Another 26 people were injured, 20 seriously. | |
It is is the worst mass killing in Japan since the end of World War Two. | |
Police arrested a man who allegedly admitted to the killings at a nearby police station shortly afterwards. | |
The 26-year-old former employee of the care facility, named in local media as Satoshi Uematsu, is reported to have told police he wanted disabled people to disappear. | |
The Tsukui Yamayuri Garden facility, where the attack happened, is a care centre set on extensive grounds with separate living quarters for men and women. It had about 160 residents at the time of the attack, according to local officials. | |
Reports say the attacker entered the facility at about 02:30 local time (17:30 GMT) and began stabbing people inside. Eight staff members were on duty at the time at the centre. | |
Television footage on Japanese channels showed many ambulances and police officers lined up outside the facility. | |
Mass killings are rare in Japan, which has extremely strict gun control laws. In 2008, a man drove a truck into a packed shopping district at Akihabara in Tokyo, before climbing out and randomly stabbing people. Seven people died. | |
The attack occurred on the same date that a man with a history of mental illness stabbed eight children to death at an Osaka primary school in 2001. | The attack occurred on the same date that a man with a history of mental illness stabbed eight children to death at an Osaka primary school in 2001. |