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By John Feng
China Editor
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At least two people died and 10 others were injured at an elementary school in eastern China on Monday after being attacked by a knife-wielding suspect, authorities said.
A statement released by police in the town of Wenfang in Guixi, in China's Jiangxi province, said a 45-year-old female suspect was detained in connection with the incident at the local Mingde elementary school.
The woman, identified only by the last name Pan, allegedly carried out the attack with a "fruit knife," authorities said. She caused injuries to 12 people, two of whom were later declared dead after attempts to treat them were unsuccessful, they said.
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Four victims were said to have suffered non-life-threatening injuries, the police said, while six others suffered minor injuries "while evading" the suspect during the knife attack.
The victims were being treated at a local public hospital, state media reports said. It was not immediately clear how many children were among the dead or injured.
The Beijing News, a state-owned newspaper, said the school was evacuated following the alleged stabbing, which authorities said happened at around noon local time.
Social media images, which Newsweek could not independently verify, showed young students appearing unresponsive while being tended to on school grounds, their uniforms stained with what appears to be large amounts of blood.
China Newsweek, a magazine published by the state-run China News Service, described the incident as a "vicious attack." The outlet—among the first to report the incident—said "multiple students" were harmed in the stabbing.
Authorities in Guixi were yet to speculate on a possible motive for the attack or why the elementary school might have been targeted. An investigation was ongoing, they said.
The city's public security bureau did not answer multiple calls seeking comment.
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Knife attacks leading to mass casualties are rare in China, but the country has seen several notable cases this year.
Earlier this month, authorities in Yunnan, a southwestern Chinese province, detained a man suspected of carrying out a knife attack inside a hospital, killing two people and injuring 21 others.
Schools have been targeted for similar acts in the past.
In 2020, nearly 40 children and teachers at an elementary school in China's southern region of Guangxi were injured by a security guard in an incident described by one state-owned paper as a "frenzied stabbing."
Last July, a knife-wielding man killed six people, including three children, and injured a seventh person at a kindergarten in southern Guangdong province.
Update 5/20/24, 6:30 a.m. ET: This breaking news story was updated with additional information.
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