Nepalese man admits to killing wife, baby

KUTCHAN, Hokkaido--Police arrested a 26-year-old Nepalese man Tuesday who has admitted to killing his wife and throwing their baby daughter off a bridge into a river.

B.K. Shyam said he killed his Japanese wife, Chie, 29, when she brought up the issue of divorce, and that their 6-month-old child is already dead, according to police.

Police searched the Shiribetsugawa river near the curry shop that the couple had operated, but they had not discovered the baby girl as of Wednesday evening.

The body of the woman was found around 2:20 a.m. Tuesday by her father on the restaurant's second floor, which served as the couple's home. Shyam had rushed into his in-laws' house near the restaurant.

Shyam is believed to have killed his wife by kicking her on the chest several times, striking her on the face with a blunt object and strangling her between late Monday and early Tuesday.

An autopsy showed she suffered from suffocation and shock from the injuries to her face, according to police.

The couple opened the restaurant last year on the property of a cottage that Chie's parents ran in the popular ski resort area near the Niseko mountain range.

They became acquainted in Nepal, which Chie visited for two months each in 2005 and 2006, and married in March last year.

The restaurant was not doing well and Chie had talked about divorce, sources said.(IHT/Asahi: May 8,2008)