Man kills himself after attacking school kids in China

BEIJING - A Chinese man immolated himself after viciously hitting five kindergarten children and a teacher with a hammer at a school in China’s Shandong province Friday, police said. This is the third attack on school children in as many days

The attacker, identified as Wang Yonglai, a farmer from Shangzhuang village in Fangzi district of the province, broke down a side gate of the school at 7.40 a.m. local time.

Wielding a hammer, he hit five children and struck the foot of a teacher who tried to block him. He then soaked himself in gasoline and grabbed two children in his arms before setting himself on fire at the Shangzhuang Primary School in Shandong’s Weifang city, Xinhua quoted a spokesman for the city government as saying.

The two children were pulled away by teachers, but the man died at the scene, he said.

All five injured children were taken to hospital, where doctors said their condition was stable, he said.

This was the third attack on a school in China in three consecutive days.

Twenty-eight children were stabbed Thursday by a 47-year-old unemployed man, identified as Xu Yuyuan, at Zhongxin Kindergarten in Taixing city in Jiangsu province. A day earlier, 16 primary school students were attacked by a mentally-unstable 33-year-old man, named Chen Kangbing at the Leicheng First Primary School in Guangdong province’s Leizhou city.

Two teachers and a security guard were also injured in Thursday’s attack, while a teacher had been injured in Wednesday’s incident, officials said.