Local police are investigating a case in which three Chinese citizens were allegedly killed by three deserters from the North Korean army on April 24 in the border city of Helong, located in the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture in Northeast China's Jilin Province.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei said Wednesday that Helong police are investigating the case.

"Local police received a report early on Saturday morning that a 67-year-old man surnamed Sun, a 55-year-old man surnamed Zhao and his 26-year-old daughter were killed in Longcheng township, in [Helong]," the Helong government publicity department said on Wednesday morning via its official Sina Weibo account, without revealing the identity of the suspects.

South Korea's state-run KBS television station reported on Tuesday that three North Korean soldiers appeared in Longcheng township's Shiren village on Friday, which is located just across the border from North Korea's Taehongdan county, in Ryanggang Province, and killed three Chinese villagers with some kind of weapon.

If the police investigation finds that the KBS report is accurate, this will be the third time killings by North Koreans in the border region have been reported in the last eight months.

A North Korean soldier killed four locals in the course of a burglary in a village in Nanping township, Helong on December 27, 2014. The soldier was later arrested by Chinese border police. The soldier was allegedly detained just north of the Tumen River, which forms part of the boundary between China and North Korea. The Chinese foreign ministry also "lodged representations" to North Korea afterwards. On September 3, 2014, a family of three in the same village was killed by a hammer-wielding North Korean.

In December 2013, a North Korean man killed an elderly Chinese couple in the Chinese border city of Yanji and stole 20,000 yuan ($3,210). He was caught by Chinese authorities after fleeing to Beijing.