School blast parents accuse Chinese authorities of cover up

Parents of children who died in a school explosion in a remote Chinese village say authorities are trying to implement a cover-up.

As Tom O'Byrne reports, they are disputing a government-sponsored view the 41 children's deaths were the fault of a lone bomber.

After three days of reports quoting doctors and parents angry their children had been making fireworks at the Jiangxi province school, China's media have now switched to running the same official version of events. That, according to a Xinhua announcement, is that a mentally-unstable villager set off explosives as part of a suicide mission. Parents though are telling foreign media outlets that the government is trying to cover up the problem because of the embarrassment of child labour problems in China. Others say the rest of the school has since been bulldozed to the ground. All access to the area has been barred by round-the-clock armed police patrols. Tom O'Byrne, Beijing.

10/03/01 5:20:50 | ABC Radio Australia News

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