Chinese police told 'shoot to kill' to protect pupils

From Times Online May 4, 2010

Police in a Chinese city have been given shoot-to-kill powers at schools after a series of attacks against young pupils left eight dead and dozens wounded.

The extreme measure is a sign of the nervousness across China as classes resumed after the three-day May Day holiday weekend.

China’s Ministry of Public Security issued an emergency notice at the weekend ordering tighter security at schools and kindergartens nationwide after three attacks on schools in as many days last week left nearly 50 children and several teachers injured.

In southwestern Chongqing, a sprawling metropolis of more than 30 million people, police have decided to take no chances.

The Chongqing Evening News reported: “The police have clear regulations in these odious cases where direct attacks occurring at or in the vicinity of schools have injured students or children."

The newspaper said: “If they cannot contain the violent acts, police can shoot to kill in accordance with the law.”

Violent crime is unusual in China and, while police do sometimes carry firearms, they rarely use them.

However, the recent wave of attacks on schools in which men armed with knives have rampaged through classrooms slashing and hacking at children, as well as caretakers and teachers who tried to block the assaults, has shocked the nation.

On Friday last week, a farmer wielding a hammer battered five children and a teacher at a kindergarten in eastern China before setting himself on fire and killing himself.

The day before, a jobless man who said he was angry at a series of personal and professional setbacks slashed 29 children and three adults at a kindergarten in southeastern China with a knife used for slaughtering pigs.

Less than 24 hours before that, a 33-year-old former teacher with a history of mental illness injured 15 students and a teacher in a knife attack on a primary school in southern China.

The incidents appeared to be copycat attacks.

Last week, a former medical worker in eastern Fujian province was executed for stabbing to death eight children and wounding five others as they waited outside their school. He told the court he was enraged after his girlfriend jilted him.

Most schools in China have a security guard who sits in a box at the gate, but these men are barely armed in a society where a tough “one couple, one child” family planning policy means children are adored and usually spoilt.

The country’s security chief stressed yesterday that child safety was an issued that “most worried people”.

Zhou Yongkang, a member of the Politburo Standing Committee, said: “We must take fast action to strengthen security for schools and kindergartens to create a harmonious environment for children to study and grow up in.”

He ordered an increase in police patrols around schools and kindergartens and instructed health and civil affairs authorities to improve their management and treatment of people with mental disorders.

From: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article7115702.ece