[E004]Six inmates in Taiwan hostage standoff commit suicide

摘自：【Yahoo News Digest】

Six prisoners at a southern Taiwan jail committed suicide on Thursday,ending astandoff[和局；僵持；冷淡；平衡] after they took several staff hostage to complain about unfair trials and demand their freedom.The Justice Ministry[司法部] said authorities had rejected the inmates[同狱犯人]' demands for safe exit from the prison during the hours-long standoff after the inmates seized weapons.By the pre-dawn[黎明前] hours on Thursday,the inmates had released all hostages except thewarden[典狱官].They then shot themselves,and the warden was able to walk free,Deputy[副部长] Justice Minister Chen Ming-tang said in a televised interview.

"We tried to use all kinds of means to persuade them to release the hostages so the incident could come to a peaceful end and to prevent an unfortunate situation"-Deputy Justice Minister Chen Ming-tang

The incident started when the inmates serving long sentences for burglary,murder and drug crimes-took four rifles,six handguns and more than 200 bullets from the prison's armory,the ministry said.The ringleader[罪魁祸首；元凶],Cheng Li-te,belonged to the notorious[声名狼藉的，臭名昭著的] mafia[黑手党]-type organization Bamboo Union and was serving 28 1/2-year sentence for homicide,the ministry said.The other five inmates were serving sentences ranging from 25 years to life.