American Tourist Killed at Gulou
An American tourist was killed by the Drum and Bell Towers, a major Beijing tourist attraction, today. The details coming in are very vague, but something sounds suspicious about this story (which may be a result of the fact that not everything has been sorted out yet). Here is part of the CNN report:
The attacker, identified as a 47-year-old man from the eastern Chinese city Hangzhou, jumped to his death from the second level of the Drum Tower, a spokesman for the Beijing Municipal Government Information Office told Xinhua.
The official said both U.S. citizens had entered China with tourist visas. The report did not say how they were attacked.
Any time an attacker immediately kills himself after a murder, the situation should require a deeper look.
Another thing to note is that this attack happened in the middle of the afternoon, and was not exactly a bar fight gone bad. Everything about this is suspicious and I suspect that there is much more to the story.
This is a very bad start to the Games.
[Update: An error in the original post was quickly pointed out by a reader and removed. In addition, word is that the victim was related to one of the coaches from the US men's volleyball team.
In addition, as of this writing I have seen no Chinese coverage of the attack. Nothing on television, the English language press nor the Chinese language press. At some point they will have to say something.]
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Yoo responds:
Posted: August 9th, 2008 at 5:46 pm →
I think there’s a misunderstanding here. It says they entered with tourist visas, which is easy to check by looking at their passports.
chriswaugh_bj responds:
Posted: August 9th, 2008 at 7:10 pm →
That report mentioned Xinhua, so I just checked their site, both English and Chinese. Why bother? Nothing, of course.
Checking elsewhere- and taking timezones into account (it is, afterall, 11pm in New Zealand as I write this. I’m thinking Europe and the Americas are going to be in better shape to be on this story), Le Monde has a very, very brief report that adds even less to the story here:
http://tinyurl.com/6oh599
Hmmm…. Perhaps I should break this up lest the number of links gets me dumped in the spam box.
chriswaugh_bj responds:
Posted: August 9th, 2008 at 7:10 pm →
Le Figaro tries to go all dramatic with even less detail:
http://tinyurl.com/5cj4q4
chriswaugh_bj responds:
Posted: August 9th, 2008 at 7:11 pm →
Al Jazeera rather tastelessly lumps it in with some idiot protestors:
http://tinyurl.com/6qr29x
chriswaugh_bj responds:
Posted: August 9th, 2008 at 7:20 pm →
And I think I’ll leave the media of the Americas to those who know the region. Meanwhile it seems most foreign media are more obsessed with South Ossetia (and no offence intended to the Beijing victims and their families, but in the grand scheme of things… ) and the Chinese media seems to a) have no idea what breaking news is; and b) be predictably following Xinhua’s lead of public silence for the time being. Well, no, the Chinese media is still in the ecstasy of doing rude things to Zhang Yimou over last night’s opening ceremony. My wife is watching CCTV 1’s 新闻联播 right now and that’s all their is. Newspaper websites are no different.
But I disagree that they’ll have to say anything more than has already been said. It would be wise for China’s foreign-oriented media to cover this story, but I fear perhaps the misdirection of domestic political concerns may see this story buried on the China-oriented side of things. We shall see.
stuart responds:
Posted: August 9th, 2008 at 7:26 pm →
CCTV 9 just gave it 15 seconds. Gave the basic facts and moved quickly on.
chriswaugh_bj responds:
Posted: August 9th, 2008 at 7:45 pm →
Terribly sorry about the 10 gazillion comments (actually, not really) but China News Service (not quite as official as Xinhua) has a report here:
http://tinyurl.com/665jp9
Apart from assuring us the police rushed to the scene as soon as the attack was reported, immediately rushed the victims to the nearest hospital (one hates to think….) and are carrying out an investigation, it adds nothing new. Anyway, the story is at least out there in the Chinese media (for now).
Richard responds:
Posted: August 9th, 2008 at 8:16 pm →
Here’s the New York Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/sports/AP-OLY-China-American-Killed.html?hp
Chineselive.info responds:
Posted: August 12th, 2008 at 3:21 pm →
Sad story. I v no idea what s the stimulus behind the killing. But taken that the man commit suicide shortly after, probably it is a random incident. http://www.chineselives.info
Michellehe responds:
Posted: August 14th, 2008 at 2:13 pm →
When I saw this news, it is 14th Agu. last 9th Agu. I was enjoying Olympic Holiday at home.
It is a sad news, people come to Beijing for embrace joyment not death, but it did happen without any reasons.
Their heart is breaking, their sorrow is blooding, may GOD bless these people, who suffering from the tragic news.
Even they say it is a individual case, however, I don’t believe it, social security issue is the top concern for all people in our society, we can never ignore it.
The huge gap, the social unrest, the imbalance, the discrimination, the pressure among social gourp become worse and worse, I see more and more people turn to have bad temper than before, they act like bomb, a little push will lead unbearable disaster for ordinary people.
For me, I take more patience than before to deal with these live bomb.
Now we can do nothing to recover the poor one’s life, I think his death left the BJOG not only dark shadow but bitter taste.
And all of us who know the news, please pray for his beloved ones, because they lost one of their best friend and familymumber. May God bless all these suffering one.