China executes man who injured more than 30 in bus fire

An arsonist who injured more than 30 people by setting fire to a bus in the Chinese city of Hangzhou was executed on Thursday, authorities said.

The Hangzhou Intermediate People’s Court, which sentenced Bao Laixu to death in February, said in a statement that the punishment was carried out Thursday morning.

Bao poured paint thinner onto the floor of a bus he was riding in the eastern city last July, then ignited the liquid, the court said previously.

He pleaded guilty at trial and explained his motivation as wanting to take “revenge on society” and commit suicide because he had tuberculosis, the official Xinhua news agency reported on Thursday.

Bao himself was burned and attended his trial on a gurney after his feet were amputated because of the injuries, state media have said.

Social tensions have mounted in China in recent years against a backdrop of a widening income gap and abuses of public power, with disputes even over trifling issues sometimes triggering serious incidents.

In 2013, 11 nursing home patients burned to death in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang after one of them set the facility on fire in a row over money, according to previous reports.