Japan said Thursday a 10-year-old boy who was stabbed while on his way to school in Shenzhen, China, has died of his injuries.
The attack happened Wednesday and authorities in China said a 44-year-old suspect was arrested.
"I take the incident extremely seriously," Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa told reporters.
"This should never happen in any country,” Kamikawa said. “Particularly, I sincerely regret that this despicable act was committed against a child on his way to school."
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said at a Wednesday news conference the case is “still under investigation” and that China will “continue to take effective measures to protect the safety of all foreigners.”
The stabbing follows two June knife attacks on foreigners in China. On June 11, four instructors from a U.S. college were attacked in northeastern China when walking through a park, in what China's Foreign Ministry called an isolated event.
Two weeks later, a man attacked a bus used by a Japanese school in the eastern city of Suzhou, leading to injuries for a Japanese mother and child along with the death of a Chinese woman who tried to stop the assailant.
Japan's Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary, Hiroshi Moriya, said Japan has requested detailed information about Wednesday’s stabbing and called for Beijing to prevent such an attack from happening again.
Moriya added that "Japan will continue to work closely with the Chinese authorities and make every effort to ensure the safety of its overseas nationals.”
Other Japanese schools in China advised their students to be careful. The Guangzhou Japanese school, near Shenzhen, requested parents accompany their children to and from school for the rest of the week and avoid speaking Japanese loudly in public spaces.
Earlier this year, for the first time, Japan subsidized bus security for Japanese schools in China, as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs requested around $2.5 million in government subsidies to hire security guards for school buses in China.
Wednesday marked the 93rd anniversary of a train bombing that Japan used as a pretext for invading northeastern China in 1931.
Some information for this report was provided by from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters
