Jonesboro massacre: Catalogue of death

KIGALI - President Bill Clinton said yesterday that he would ask the Attorney General, Janet Reno, to investigate the problem of school shootings.

"I do think we've reached the point where we have to analyse these incidents to see whether or not we can learn anything [and] what we can do to prevent further ones," said Mr Clinton, who is on a 12-day tour of Africa.

The Jonesboro shooting was the third fatal shooting rampage in a school in the past five months.

On 1 December, a boy opened fire on a student prayer circle at a high school in West Paducah, Kentucky, killing three students and wounding five. A 14-year-old student, described as small and emotionally immature, was arrested.

Two months earlier, a 16-year-old outcast in Pearl, Mississippi, was accused of killing his mother, then going to school and shooting nine students. Two of them died, including the boy's former girlfriend. Authorities later charged six friends with conspiracy, saying the suspects were part of a group that dabbled in Satanism.

The President said in Kigali that he wanted Reno to find "whatever experts there are in our country" on this sort of violence to see how it may be prevented.