35 dead, 43 injured in vehicle attack at sports center in China

(UPI) — A man drove a vehicle into a crowd at a sports center in Zhuhai, China, killing 35 people and injuring 43 others, police said.

The Zhuhai Municipal Public Security Bureau said in a statement that the “serious and vicious” attack Monday evening appeared to be deliberate on the part of the 62-year-old driver.

The driver, identified by the surname Fan, was detained at the scene, but was comatose due to a self-inflicted knife wound to the neck, police said.

A preliminary investigation found Fan was angry about the division of assets from his divorce, the statement said.

Investigators determined Fan, driving a small off-road vehicle, had crashed through a gate at the sports center and steered into a crowd of people who were exercising.

State-run Chinese news agency Xinhua reported Chinese President Xi Jinping called on Tuesday for Fan to be “severely punished in accordance with the law.”

The attack took place on the eve of the annual Zhuhai airshow, which featured the debut of China’s J-35A stealth fighter jet.

The incident is the latest in a string of violent incidents targeting civilians.

At least 11 people were killed in September when a bus crashed into a group of students and parents outside a school in Shandong, and that same month a 10-year-old boy on his way to a Japanese school in Shenzhen was fatally stabbed by a Chinese man.

Three people were killed and 15 injured in a knife attack at a Shanghai supermarket in an October incident on the eve of the 75th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China.

Victor Shih, an expert on Chinese politics at the University of California, San Diego, said tensions are high in the country as a result of economic factors.

“When domestic demand is so weak and the largest property bubble the world has ever seen has popped, the wealth of the vast majority of households is shrinking and that will inevitably cause a lot of social tensions,” Shih told The New York Times.

Source: UPI News