On Saturday night (November 16), a knife attack occurred at a vocational college in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, China, resulting in 8 deaths and 17 injuries. This is the second mass killing incident in China within a week. Since June of this year, at least 9 major violent incidents resulting in deaths or attacks on foreigners have taken place in China.
The suspect in the knife attack at Wuxi Institute of Technology and Crafts is a 21-year-old male surnamed Xu. According to the Yixing police statement, Xu admitted to the attack after being detained at the scene. It is alleged that his motives were failing an exam and dissatisfaction with his internship wages.
Earlier this week, the most severe mass killing case in a decade occurred in Zhuhai, Guangdong Province, where a driver intentionally drove into a crowd on a pedestrian track at a local sports center, resulting in 35 deaths and dozens of injuries. Authorities have charged a 62-year-old man surnamed Fan with the crime. Zhuhai police stated that the suspect was reportedly angry about the terms of his divorce settlement.
Analysts suggest that a recent series of violent attacks in China indicate an escalation of social tensions as the country’s economic growth slows down, leading to rising unemployment and declining household incomes.
“It seems striking that people resort to such large-scale violence because they feel they have nothing to lose,” said Steve Tsang, the Director of the China Institute at the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies, to the Financial Times.
According to Reuters reports since June 2024, China has seen at least 9 malicious attacks, including multiple large-scale incidents and violence targeting foreigners.
Four American teachers were stabbed while visiting Beishan Park in Jilin City, Jilin Province. The Chinese authorities only disclosed this attack more than 24 hours later and deleted images of the incident from Chinese social media platforms.
A man in his 50s unemployed in China attacked a Japanese school bus, injuring three people – a Japanese boy and his mother, with a Chinese staff member trying to protect the students dying.
In Shenyang, a 64-year-old man’s knife attack resulted in three deaths and one injury.
A 10-year-old Japanese boy was stabbed to death by a 44-year-old unemployed man on his way to school. The attack occurred on the 93rd anniversary of the “918 Incident.”
At a Walmart supermarket in Ludu International Shopping Plaza on Songhui Middle Road in Shanghai’s Songjiang District, a 37-year-old man indiscriminately attacked customers with a knife, causing three deaths and 15 injuries. Preliminary investigations suggest that the suspect acted out of anger over personal financial disputes.
A man in his 60s stabbed three individuals, including two elementary school students, at the entrance of a primary school in Tianhe District, Guangzhou. The suspect had previously been convicted of attempted murder for stabbing his ex-girlfriend and was released from prison in March.
In an incident at No. 3 Primary School in Zhongguancun, Haidian District, Beijing, a 50-year-old man attacked at least five people, including three children, during dismissal time.
The night before the Zhuhai Air Show, on November 11, a 62-year-old man drove an off-road vehicle into Zhuhai Sports Center, indiscriminately ramming into people walking and exercising, resulting in 35 deaths and 43 severe injuries. The man was reportedly dissatisfied with the property division in his divorce agreement.
Police reported that a former student committed the attack at a vocational college, resulting in 8 deaths and 17 injuries. The attacker was reportedly angry due to not receiving his graduation certificate and failing exams.
Information on mainland China’s attack incidents is hard to come by, as discussions on these events are censored by the Chinese Communist Party, and related videos are quickly removed from online platforms.
On Sunday, Reuters witnesses saw students leaving Wuxi Institute of Technology and Crafts carrying suitcases.
“They are just 18-19-year-old kids. It’s too tragic, too sad,” said a man surnamed Duan to Reuters as he placed a bouquet of chrysanthemums near the school gate.
The security guards promptly removed the flowers.
Fudan University Professor Qu Weiguo noted that recent cases of “indiscriminate retaliation against society” in China share common characteristics: the suspects are often vulnerable individuals, many with mental health issues, who believe they have been unfairly treated and feel they have no other way to express themselves.
“It’s essential to establish a social safety net and psychological counseling system. However, to minimize such incidents, the most effective approach is to have public channels for oversight and disclosure of power use,” Qu wrote in a Weibo post.
This short article has been removed by the CCP censors on Sunday afternoon.
Following the attack on a Japanese school bus in Suzhou, Shuai Wei, a lecturer in sociology, social policy, and criminology at the University of Liverpool, told the Financial Times, “The reliability of China’s (CCP’s) crime data is often questioned due to possible underreporting and manipulation of statistics for political reasons.”
Wei stated that in China, past research has shown that the crime rate correlates with several economic indicators, including inflation, unemployment rates, and urban-rural consumption and employment disparities.
Over the past year, online discussions in China have focused on people’s pessimism about employment, income, and future opportunities, with the “trash time of history” becoming a symbol of public despair about the economy during the summer.