Guo Bin recuperates from the attack beside his mother (Picture: AP)

A woman who gouged out a six-year-old Chinese boy’s eyes was his aunt who later killed herself, it has emerged.

The boy has been pictured in hospital with his eyes bandaged and his distraught parents by his bedside, unable to tell him he will be blind for the rest of his life.

Guo Bin, whose also goes by the nickname Bin Bin, was quoted as asking his mother ‘why is the sky still so dark?’.

Police in the city of Linfen in northern Shanxi province confirmed an official Xinhua news agency report saying the boy’s aunt Zhang Huiying was a suspect because his blood was found on her clothes.




Six days after the boy was attacked, Zhang killed herself by jumping into a well.

Xinhua did not cite a possible motive for the aunt to attack the boy.

Guo Bin is pushed on a wheelchair by a doctor and a nurse at a hospital (Picture: AP)

Initial reports said he had been playing outside his home on the evening of August 24 when he was lured by an unidentified woman into a field where she used a tool to gouge out his eyes.

Family members found the boy late at night in a remote area, his face covered in blood, eyelids swollen.

The new evidence found by police conflicts with the family’s earlier comments on the boy’s assailant.

They said the woman spoke with an accent from outside the area and had hair that was dyed blonde.

Bin Bin’s mother said the boy was disoriented after the traumatising attack.

‘It is easy to understand that he wasn’t clear about the situation,’ Wang Wenli told The Associated Press.

‘He said her accent was from another region, but he later amended that. He then said it was a local accent, but he did not say that it was his aunt.’

Guo Bin’s aunt is suspected of gouging his eyes out (Picture: AP)

But she declined to talk about the police evidence against her sister-in-law, saying: ‘The police did not tell us anything. I do not know.’

Since the attack there has been speculation it was to remove his corneas for sale, though these were found at the scene.

Other reports have said the aunt had argued with Bin Bin’s parents over how much money each family should contribute to the care of his grandfather, who was paralysed.

Wang’s brother Wang Wenjun, one of the boy’s uncles, also said the aunt, might have been mentally ill.

Since being blinded, offers of help have poured in for Bin Bin including specialist treatment to fit him with artificial eye balls.