Outrage over alleged abuse at Beijing preschool

BEIJING: Police have launched an investigation into alleged child abuse at a preschool here after parents found apparent needle marks on toddlers, sparking new outrage days after a scandal at another daycare.

Distraught and angry parents also reported that children were given unidentified pills at the RYB Education New World kindergarten, run by a company that started trading on the New York stock exchange in September.

The Chaoyang district government said police opened an investigation after parents called the authorities on Wednesday to report the suspected abuse.

Authorities declined to provide more details.

RYB apologised to parents and said it was cooperating with the police investigation.

“We are working with the police to provide surveillance materials and equipment. The teachers in question have been suspended,” the company said on Weibo, China’s equivalent of Twitter.

Furious parents gathered outside the school on Thursday, according to footage from state television network CCTV.

It showed images of apparent needle marks on some children. The magazine Caixin said eight children had such marks and that the incidents occurred in two classes with children aged between 2 and 6.

“I asked my child after I heard what other parents said, and my child said that they had taken two white pills after lunch and slept after eating the pills,” one father told CCTV.

RYB Education operates 80 kindergartens and has franchised another 175 in 130 cities across China for children ranging from newborns to 6-year-olds, according to its Nasdaq listing.

RYB previously apologised in April and suspended the head of a kindergarten here after admitting that teachers committed “severe mistakes”.

The latest allegations came a week after Chinese online travel agency Ctrip suspended two officials, after footage emerged of workers abusing toddlers at a company daycare in Shanghai. AFP