Suspect killed after 13 kindergarteners taken hostage, beaten in Brazil

Man spreads flammable liquid in a room with 13 children while holding a lighter as police try to negotiate.Brazilian police have rescued 13 children who had been taken hostage at a kindergarten in the southern city of Curitiba after killing the suspect, who threatened to set fire to the building, according to officials.At least one of the children was wounded in Friday’s incident, the commander of the military police special forces unit in Parana state, Alexandre Lopes Dias, told reporters without elaborating on who or what injured the child.Parana police spokesperson Leticia Martins told journalists outside the kindergarten that the suspect jumped the gate on Friday, broke into a classroom and held 13 children hostage.He then spread a flammable substance in the room and held a lighter in his hand. He was carrying a knife and also what was initially believed to be a firearm, but later was found to be fake.“Our negotiating teams were in place but saw no alternative but to neutralise him,” said Martins, who did not specify whether the suspect had expressed a specific reason for his actions.[Al Jazeera]The incident took place in the neighbourhood of Sao Braz in Curitiba, a city of 1.8 million residents located 400km (250 miles) south of Sao Paulo.Lopes Dias told reporters the suspect was identified as a man who suffered from schizophrenia, but he did not reveal the man’s identity or how he was killed.“During the entire negotiation, he stayed with all the children around him and one on his lap,” the police official said.Children beatenTalks lasted up to three hours. The children became agitated, and the attacker started hitting them, Lopes Dias told reporters.