Three School Children Stabbed To Death Others Sustained Injury

Police are searching for a 56-year-old suspect following the killings in Lingshan County, Guanxi Province, on Friday.

An investigation is under way after a knife-wielding attacker, reportedly on a rickshaw, stabbed four children to death as they walked to school in southern China.

Three of the primary school pupils died at the scene while the other lost their life later in hospital.

State TV reported a man from Pingshan rode a red motorised rickshaw while stabbing the children.

Police gave out the number plate of the rickshaw and offered a reward of 20,000 yuan (£2,000) for information leading to the man's capture, it added.

It is the latest in a series of deadly stabbings targeting schoolchildren over the past 10 years in China, where firearms are difficult to get hold of.

Earlier this month, an attacker killed three students in a knife attack at a school in Hubei province.

In May 2010, an attacker stabbed seven children and one teacher to death and wounded 20 other people in a rampage at a kindergarten in north-west China.

At the time, it was the fifth in a string of savage assaults at the country's schools in three months.

Many of the attacks have been carried out by adults who have no connection to the schools, with authorities saying the assailants suffered from mental illness or were lashing out at society because of personal grudges.

The stabbings have led to tighter security measures. 

Cities including Beijing require ID and registration for the purchase of some knives.

Knives have also been confiscated at the gates of schools and in the surrounding community, while students have also been given self-defence training.