School siege result of grudge against former boss

A MAN driven by a grudge against his former employer led the assault on a Cambodian school, taking dozens of children hostage and shooting a crying two-year-old Canadian boy in the head, police said yesterday.

The 23-year-old ringleader allegedly persuaded three friends to don masks and storm the school in the town of Siem Reap on Thursday morning, herding a teacher and about 30 children into a classroom.

Police say the men, all in their early 20s, wanted to extort money from the foreigners and well-off Cambodians whose children attend the school near the famed Angkor Wat temple complex - the biggest tourist attraction in this impoverished country.