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3 die in internet suicide pact
30/10/2006 12:03 - (SA)
Seoul - Three South Koreans who forged a suicide pact over the internet have been found dead in a park, police said on Monday.
The three in their 20s and mid-30s were found lying on benches in Seoul's Namsan Park on Sunday. An empty bottle of cyanide was found next to their bodies along with a suicide note.
They had met and plotted their deaths on a website before killing themselves, according to news reports confirmed by police.
Police have detained a 19-year-old female college student for allegedly assisting the suicide.
The woman, identified only as Moon, told police how the four got together, purchased cyanide and wrote a joint will. She said she changed her mind at the last minute after a phone call from her boyfriend.
The will released by police said: "We gathered here only to end our lives and swear that we have no personal relationship with each other. We do not want autopsies to find the cause of our death."
Police believe debts, divorce issues and a failure to secure admission to college helped prompt the suicides.
Website-related suicides on the rise
A total of 14 people including the latest three have killed themselves this year after visiting suicide websites, according to figures from a suicide prevention organisation.
South Korea's suicide rate was the highest among the members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development last year, with 24.7 in every 100 000 killing themselves.
"The number of those who commit suicide together after discussion through the internet has been increasing," Yonsei University psychiatrist Lee Hong-Shik told reporters.
A survey conducted by Lee last year showed 47% of teenagers and 38% of those in their 20s had visited suicide websites.
Over 20% of them said they had been tempted to commit suicide afterwards, Lee said.
Suicide website operators can be punished but many have dodged government supervision by changing the wording or the address of their pages.
- AFP
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