At least three people have been killed and six others wounded in a knife attack at a kindergarten in southeast China's Jiangxi province.

A "gangster wearing a cap and mask" stormed the private kindergarten in Anfu county at about 10:00 am local time (0200 GMT) on Wednesday, police said in a statement published on China's Twitter-like Weibo.

The 48-year-old suspect is still at large, they added.

"Public security organs are making every effort to hunt down the suspect," the police statement said.

In a video of the scene shared by state-run Beijing Daily, a police officer can be seen carrying a tiny child in his arms to an ambulance. The ages of the victims have not been announced.

School stabbings

Violent crime is rare in China, due in part to strict gun controls and tight security, but in recent years there have been several knife and axe attacks, including in schools.

And fatal attacks specifically targeting kindergarten and school students have occurred nationwide, carried out by people reportedly wishing to wreak revenge on society or because of grievances with colleagues.

The attacks have forced authorities to step up security and prompted calls for more research into the root causes of such violent acts.

Last April, two children were killed and 16 others wounded when a knife-wielding man entered a kindergarten in southern China.

In 2020, a knife-wielding attacker wounded 37 students and two adults at a primary school in southern China. Local media identified a security guard as the perpetrator.

And later that year a man was sentenced to death for poisoning dozens of children in an act of revenge against a colleague that left one toddler dead.

Source: agencies