SEOUL: A man was arrested in South Korea on Thursday (Aug 22) over an explosion at a dental hospital that caused a fire and prompted the evacuation of around 90 people, police said.
A box resembling a delivery parcel exploded at the entrance of the three-story hospital in Gwangju, around 267km south of Seoul, forcing all of the building’s occupants, including patients, to leave the premises, local police told AFP. No casualties were reported.
The box held four butane canisters and a plastic container with flammable materials, and the fire sparked by the blast damaged a ceiling and some furniture, an official at the Gwangju Metropolitan Police said.
The Gwangju police said around 45 officers, including members of the SWAT team, were dispatched to the scene.
The suspect, identified by surveillance camera footage, eventually turned himself in at a police station about two hours after the explosion, they added.
South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported that the suspect was a man in his 70s who had been treated at the hospital and allegedly planted the explosives because he was dissatisfied with the service.
He had placed the box at the hospital entrance, set it on fire, and then ran away, Yonhap said, citing authorities who reviewed the CCTV footage.
South Korea is widely regarded as a safe country, with a murder rate of just 1.4 per 100,000 people in 2022, and extreme violent crimes, including acts of terrorism, are rare.
