SHANGHAI, Aug. 13 — The head of a Chinese company that was behind the recall earlier this month of more than a million Mattel toys committed suicide over the weekend, China’s state-controlled media reported today.

Zhang Shuhong, a Hong Kong businessman and owner of the Lee Der Industrial Company, a company that made toys for Mattel for 15 years, hanged himself in a company warehouse in Foshan, in southern China, the Southern Metropolis Daily said today.

There was no independent confirmation of the suicide. A person who answered the phone at Lee Der’s office in Foshan City, near Guangzhou, immediately hung up.

A spokeswoman for Mattel, which is based in El Segundo, Calif., released a statement this morning that said “We were saddened to learn of this tragic news.”