Crime: Father calls on son suspected of child murder to surrender or kill himself

The father of a young man suspected of sexually assaulting and murdering an 11-year-old girl yesterday urged his son to surrender to police or to kill himself.

"It's come to the point where I hope he commits suicide rather than do any more harm," said Michael Khatchadourian, who found the body of the murdered girl in the cold store of his grocery shop in the suburbs of Bordeaux.

Christophe Khatchadourian, 25, who is also suspected of sexually assaulting and stabbing another girl, aged 10, has been on the run for five days. "He should have the courage to give himself up before he commits any other act of madness," the father told the newspaper Aujourd'hui-Le Parisien.

Mr Khatchadourian found the half-naked body of Cynthia Cazaurang when he re-opened his shop after the lunch-hour last Thursday. The little girl, who lived nearby, had been shot through the head.

"Christophe is no longer my son after what he did," Mr Khatchadourian said.

- John Lichfield, Paris