Qiu Xinghua, suspected of killing 10 people in a temple in Shaanxi Province, has apparently confessed that he killed several of them out of hatred.

According to local police, Qiu, 47, who was arrested on Saturday, said he committed the crime mainly because he hated Xiong Wancheng, one of the victims, who Qiu claimed had insulted his wife.

Xiong was in charge of the temple near Qiu's hometown in Shiquan County. The other victims were five temple workers and four farmers.

According to police sources, Xiong was killed with an axe, and his eyes were plucked out and stomach cut open. On the wall of the temple Chinese characters meaning "must be killed" were written in blood.

The extreme cruelty of the killing and the writing could show how the killer really hated Xiong, police said. They added that the writing matched Qiu's.

They said he went to the temple on July 15 and killed the victims with an axe blow to the head. The murders are thought to have happened around midnight when the victims were asleep in several rooms.

After he was finally tracked down more than a month later, Qiu told police he hated the workers in the temple because he had quarrelled with them.

"Qiu told us that he thought Xiong had insulted his wife and he had quarrelled with temple workers when he went there to worship in June. He wanted revenge by killing them," Qin Kangjian, director of the Ankang Municipal Public Security Bureau, said on Tuesday.

Police said Qiu killed the farmers because they were potential witnesses to the other murders.

(China Daily August 23, 2006)