S.African police shoot 3-year-old boy: watchdog

JOHANNESBURG (AFP) – A three-year-old boy has been shot dead by South African police, a watchdog said on Tuesday, highlighting the struggle to fight crime after President Jacob Zuma backed calls for more police firepower.

The Independent Complaints Directorate, which monitors the police, said the boy was shot dead by a police officer on Saturday in Klipfontein, northeast of Johannesburg, during a hunt for a murder suspect.

"The police officer in question was arrested soon after the shooting," the directorate's spokesman Moses Dlamini told AFP.

Three-year-old Atlegang Phalane was shot dead in the back seat of a car, where he was seated with his uncle Bongani Mchunu, Dlamini said.

Police had received a tip that a murder suspect was at the address where the car was parked, he said.

"It is alleged that one member of the officers saw a pipe which looked like a firearm and then fired in the direction of the pipe, killing the boy instantly," he said.

No pipe or firearm was found.

Mchunu told local media one plainclothes officer ordered him to the ground, while another removed Atlegang's body and placed it on the ground.

"They screamed at me saying I was a suspect, but they would not say what I did," Mchunu said, adding that the officers did not ask any questions or fire a warning shot, according to The Star newspaper.

South Africa has one of the world's highest crime rates, with an average of 50 killings every day.

Current law allows police to use lethal force only if their lives or the lives of innocent bystanders are in danger.

Zuma's government has proposed allowing police to use a "shoot-first" policy if a criminal is holding a gun.

"My thinking is that once a criminal takes out the gun, the intention is clear. The police must then act to protect himself or herself and the citizens," Zuma said in September.