“I cannot help but feel pain at being informed that the child passed away before dawn,” lamented the Japanese foreign minister, Yoko Kamikawato the press.
Police in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen said a man attacked a minor on Wednesday morning and the boy was rushed to hospital. The suspect, a 44-year-old man, was arrested, the police added. Japanese media reported that the boy was 10 years old and was attacked near the Japanese school in the Chinese megacity.
“We immediately demand that China provide an explanation of the facts,” declared the Japanese prime minister, Fumio Kishida“We will firmly urge China to ensure the safety of Japanese citizens and prevent this from happening again.”
Beijing expressed “sadness” at the crime, the motives of which are still unknown, but said it was an “isolated case.”
On Wednesday, before the death, the Japanese Foreign Ministry had summoned the Chinese ambassador in Tokyo to express its “grave concern” about the attack and to ask for increased security at Japanese schools in China.
The stabbing coincided with the anniversary of the “Mukden Incident” On September 18, 1931, Japanese troops used an explosion on a railway as a pretext to first occupy this city in northeastern China (now called Shenyang) and then the entire region of Manchuria.
The Japanese ministry did not specify whether it believed the attack was specifically aimed at one of its citizens.
In June, a Japanese woman and her son were injured in another stabbing in Suzhou, near Shanghai, which the Chinese Foreign Ministry called an “isolated incident.” That attack resulted in the death of a 55-year-old Chinese woman who tried to stop the attacker.