Chinese police have seized a suspect who allegedly murdered seven villagers in the southwestern Guizhou Province.

Hu Yunchao, a resident of the Jiekui Village in the Huaxi Township of Qianxi County, was seized in the Cixi City in the eastern Zhejiang Province at 9 a.m. Wednesday, a spokesman for Guizhou police said.

The police said Hu fled after murdering seven people in the Jiekui Village Sunday afternoon, including Luo Chaojiang and his wife, and the family of five of another villager, Zhou Caixue. All of Zhou's three sons -- aged 10, seven and five -- were among the dead.

The police spokesman did not give further details as to what Hu's motive was for committing the killings and what weapon he had used.

Qianxi, a mountainous county to the northwest of Guiyang, the provincial capital of Guizhou, is one of the poorest areas in China.

(Xinhua News Agency March 5, 2009)