Knife attacker kills three in Belgian nursery

A man with a white painted face and blackened eyes stabbed two infants and a woman to death and injured 13 at a nursery in western Belgium yesterday before cycling away.

Eleven children and two female staff were being treated at local hospitals, authorities said. The suspected attacker, who Belgian media said was a psychiatric patient, was detained soon afterwards at a local shop.

The assailant arrived at the day care centre in Dendermonde, 30 kilometres west of Brussels, at around 10 a.m. (0900 GMT) saying he wanted to ask a question, but then ran into two rooms to attack his victims.

There were 18 children and six adults in the creche at the time of the attack.

The man cycled away but was arrested about 90 minutes later, police said.

Belgian media said he was aged 28. Authorities did not confirm that he was a psychiatric patient, saying only that he would appear before a magistrate yesterday.

"He has been identified, but it is too early to say whether he has a past record," Justice Minister Stefaan De Clerck told reporters.

Meanwhile a policeman shot and killed a woman teacher in a parking lot outside a school in the northern Norwegian town of Tromsoe and then shot himself, police said yesterday.

Police had initially said that both the man and the woman had died, but later said the man was in a critical condition in hospital.

"This was an experienced public servant with a long record of service," Tromsoe Police Chief Truls Fyhn told a news conference broadcast by NRK radio. He did not release the man's name or position in the police force.

The man and his victim, who was a teacher in training, had lived together earlier, police said.

He said police were investigating whether the man had used his service weapon.