Six people injured in South Korea high school stabbing

At least six people sustained injuries after a knife-wielding student went on a stabbing spree at a high school in South Korea on Monday.

The student, reportedly enrolled in a special education programme due to intellectual disability, allegedly targeted teachers and staff at the school in Cheongju, 110km south of Seoul, at around 8.40am local time, state news agency Yonhap reported.

No student was injured.

The victims, including the principal, were taken to a local hospital with minor to serious injuries to face, abdomen and other body parts. None were reported to be in a critical state.

The 18-year-old student fled to a nearby lakeside park where they jumped into a reservoir, local media reported. A passerby surnamed Kim sustained injuries to the head after encountering the student during their escape.

The suspect was rescued from the reservoir within 12 minutes of the attack and taken to a local hospital, the Cheongju police said.

The police said they were investigating the motive of the attack.

The stabbing incident came three months after a teacher fatally attacked an eight-year-old student at an elementary school in Daejeon.

Last week, a 33-year-old man was arrested for fatally stabbing a woman and injuring another shopper inside a supermarket after reportedly drinking soju. One of the women, in her 60s, suffered a heart attack and succumbed at the hospital, while a store employee sustained injuries in the attack.

While South Korea has a low murder rate of 1.3 per 100,000 people – below the global average of six per 100,000 – the country has witnessed several high-profile violent crimes, including multiple stabbings, in recent years.

Among the violent incidents in recent months were a subway station stabbing that left one dead and three wounded, an attack on a high school teacher, and a knife-wielding assailant driving into pedestrians before attacking shoppers in the Bundang area near the capital.