MUAR, Malaysia, July 8 (UPI) -- The Malaysian kindergarten where a man took 30 children hostage before being killed by police will be closed four days, the operator said Friday.
Teacher Salbiah Abdul Talib told The Star of Kuala Lumpur Serikids kindergarten chief Tee Siew Tuan ordered it shut through Monday as the community recovers from shock.
The children and four teachers in the southern city of Muar were freed unharmed Thursday after a police flooded the building with tear gas and a sniper shot Lau Hui Chung, 40, in the head, ending a six-hour siege. He died Thursday night in a hospital.
Storming into the building Thursday morning with a hammer and a machete, Lau locked the doors and threatened to kill the children unless he was given a gun, Sky News reported.
A psychiatrist was sent in to talk to him, and the children were heard singing to calm him down, a witness said, but police moved in when negotiations failed.
A woman who said she was Lau's sister said he "has never hurt children," but police suspect he was the man who had attacked children in two other nearby kindergartens in the past two years.
