Beijing — Police in southern China arrested a suspected 47-year-old man an attack that killed three and injured six Others in a kindergarten in Jiangxi province.
Anfu County Police said in a statement that Liu Xiaohui was arrested at 10:50 p.m. Wednesday, about 12 hours after the morning attack. The statement said he fled and hid.
Police did not provide any information about the identity and age of the victims.
China’s Global Times newspaper reported that at least one victim was a child and that the attacker was believed to be armed with a knife.
When police first reported the attack, they said a “gangster wearing a hat and mask” carried it out in a private kindergarten, Agence France-Presse reported.
China has improved security in schools in recent years after several deadly attacks, largely attributed to either society or people with mental illnesses.
China does not allow private gun ownership, so most such attacks are carried out with knives, homemade explosives or gasoline bombs.
Nearly 100 children and adults have been killed and hundreds injured over the past decade in apparently disorganized “lone wolf” attacks, the motives of which were unclear. Most of the male attackers were either killed, took their own lives, or were prosecuted and executed.
Acts of violence against China’s youth in particular resonate particularly strongly because of the country’s low birth rate, partly due to decades of population control policies.
