A man shouted "die" as he doused an animation studio with fuel and set it ablaze in Japan Thursday, public broadcaster NHK said, killing at least 33 people in the nation's worst mass murder in nearly two decades.
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Prime Minister Shinzo Abe called the attack in the city of Kyoto - the latest grisly killing in a nation widely known for its low crime rates - "too appalling for words" and offered condolences.
Police detained a 41-year-old man who shouted "die" as he poured what appeared to be petrol around the three-story Kyoto Animation building shortly after 10 a.m. local time. It was Japan's worst mass killing since a suspected arson attack in Tokyo in 2001.
Shiro Misaki, a 47-year old owner of a neighborhood bar five minutes from the studio, said he was driving nearby when he saw the thick smoke.
"Policemen were stopping traffic and it was really hazy with smoke," he said. "Even after I got back to my restaurant I could smell the smoke."
"Today, many people were killed and wounded in an arson murder case in Kyoto," Abe said in a post on Twitter. "It is too appalling for words."
The motive was not yet known. The suspected arsonist was injured and was being treated in hospital, so police could not question him, NHK said.
The dead were found on all three floors of the building, including in the studio, and on a staircase leading up to the roof, the fire department said. It was not clear if the roughly 10 people found dead on the staircase had been trying to escape.
Thirty-six people had been taken to hospital by midday, the fire department said earlier, with 10 of them seriously injured.
There was an outpouring of support for the studio on Japanese-language social media, with some users posting pictures of animation. Many posted with the hashtag "#PrayForKyoani" - using an abbreviation for Kyoto Animation.
"It has a huge presence in animation here. To have this many people die at once will be a huge blow to the Japanese animation industry," he said.