Cremations readied for Thai day care massacre victims

Makeshift furnaces made of clay bricks were being built Monday on the grounds of Buddhist temples in a town in northeastern Thailand to cremate the bodies of the mostly young victims of last week’s massacre at a day care center by a former policeman.
Last Thursday’s brutal gun and and knife attack on the Young Children’s Development Center in Uthai Sawan left 36 people dead, including 24 young children.
It was the biggest mass killing by an individual in the country’s history. Phra Kru Adisal Kijjanuwat, abbot of the Rat Samakee temple, around 3 kilometers from the scene of the bloodshed, said 19 victims will be cremated in a group ceremony on Tuesday, bringing an end to a three-day mourning ceremony for the families.
He said the bodies would be cremated at the same time on charcoal-fueled open-air pyres to spare the families from having to wait long hours for successive ceremonies to be completed.