/ 3 December 2001

KIDS FACE MURDER CHARGE IN SENEGAL

SIX children, one as young as four, have been arrested in Senegal for killing a two-year-old boy by stuffing sand in his mouth, police said on Friday. The six boys were arrested on Thursday after the discovery of the young victim’s body partly buried on the outskirts of St. Louis, on the Atlantic coast of Senegal on the border with Mauritania, police said. They face charges of murder. According to witness testimony, the boys aged between four and 13 were “amusing themselves” by putting sand in the victim’s mouth and suffocating him. The boys said his death was an accident. – AFP