'Four children dead' in stabbing rampage at Chinese kindergarten
Jane Macartney,
China Correspondent
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Four young children are reported to have died after a former insurance salesman slashed and stabbed his way through a kindergarten in southern China, in the second such attack in as many days. The well-regarded Caijing magazine said that four children were killed in this morning's s attack. Officials declined to comment.
The man stabbed 28 children as well as a teacher, a security guard and a school volunteer who tried to protect the terrified four-year-olds. Coming less than 24 hours after a mentally ill former teacher hacked at 15 pupils and a teacher in a southern China primary school, the attack has sparked nationwide outrage and heartsearching about why children have become targets.
Officials said that Xu Yuyuan, 47, broke into a classroom at the nursery school in Taixing city in southeastern Jiangsu province at about 9.40am today and attacked the children with a 20cm (9in) knife. A photograph from the scene showed blood spattered across the school steps — presumably as the wounded were rushed to hospital.
A staff member at the Taixing No 1 People’s Hospital said that some of the wounded were being treated there. He said: “The injured have been sent here one after another. The doctors are now trying their best to save them.” Five of the children were in critical condition in hospital in Jiangsu province, said Zhu Guiming, an official with the propaganda department in Taixing city. However, officials told state media that no deaths had been reported and the condition of the most badly hurt was stabilising. Police have arrested Mr Xu, who was described as unemployed after having worked for a local insurance company until 2001.
Yesterday a 33-year-old man with a history of mental illness rushed into classrooms at the Leizhou primary school in southern Guangdong province, brandishing a knife about a foot long. He injured 16 children and a teacher, stabbing them in the back arms and head. None of the victims was reported to be in serious condition. The man then made his way to a top-floor balcony, from which threatened to throw himself off, before being arrested.
Several schools across China have been the subject of similar attacks in recent yeas, provoking anger from parents and the media. Hours before the primary school attack, state media announced the execution of a former medical worker who stabbed to death eight children on March 23 as they waited for the gates to open for morning classes at their school in eastern Fujian province. Zheng Minsheng, 41, told the court that he carried had out the attack in a fit of rage after splitting from his girlfriend.
Across the internet, the only forum for popular discussion in China, chatrooms were filled with anger at the latest attack. One comment read: “Governments, let me ask, what crime has the next generation committed and why can criminals bring these tragedies to innocent children? I appeal to the government to save our children.” Another wrote: “Our government should pause to consider seriously just what the problem is here.”
One expert attributed the string of attacks on schoolchildren to increasing social problems. Zhou Xiaozheng, a sociology professor at Renmin University in Beijing, said that the choice of schoolchildren as victims could be a form of copycat phenomenon. This sort of violent attack often happened in clusters, he said.
“It’s like suicide, which is another type of mental health problem that can spread in a community. Normally, with these kind of violent events we hope the media won’t blow them up too much. Because that tends to make it spread.”
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What a nightmare
