A 2-month-old baby who went missing when the SUV he was in was stolen is believed to be dead, authorities in Northeast China said on Tuesday.
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A man identified as Zhou Xijun handed himself to the police at around 5 pm on Tuesday and confessed to killing the child, according to local police.
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The 48-year-old said he choked the baby to death after discovering him in the back seat of a silver gray Toyota RAV4 he had just stolen in Changchun, the provincial capital, according to a police statement on Sina Weibo, the micro-blogging website.
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Zhou buried the body in the snow beside a road and abandoned the child's clothes and the SUV near a primary school in Yingchengzi village at about 8:20 am, the statement said.
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China Daily was unable to confirm with officers on Tuesday night whether the baby's body had been found.
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Public security bureaus and citizen volunteers in Changchun, the provincial capital, and surrounding cities have been searching for Xu Haobo, the missing child, since Monday morning.
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The baby's father, identified only as Xu, said he left his son wrapped in a pink blanket in an unlocked silver gray Toyota RAV4 outside his grocery store at about 7 am. The vehicle was stolen moments later.
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Police recovered the SUV on Tuesday morning.
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A security guard working close to where the vehicle was found told police he saw a man in his 30s park the SUV at about 9 am on Monday. He then got into another car and drove away, China Central Television reported.
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The guard said he did not see a baby, only a blanket and a bag, which the man was carrying.
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The vehicle's license plate - JI AMM102 - and the child's clothes were found in a roadside ditch 500 meters away.
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Shortly after hearing the child's death, his mother suffered a sudden heart attack and was taken to the hospital. She had appealed to the suspect not to harm her baby, saying she would not hold the thief accountable.
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News of the abduction attracted national attention. Following Tuesday's tragic news, many people expressed their fury at the killer and sympathy for the baby's family.
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"I'm really sorry. I can't find the words to express my grief," wrote one netizen on Sina Weibo. "There are no bad guys in heaven, baby."
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Changchun public security bureau assigned 8,000 officers to carry out a citywide search, including those from traffic and criminal investigation departments, and also received assistance from neighboring cities.
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Many citizens also joined the search.
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Sun Bing, a toll station worker in Changchun who lives near the grocery store where Xu Haobo disappeared, said he rushed to help after hearing about the abduction.
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"All of us were very worried, as the baby is only 2 months old," he said.Â