Six wounded in knife attack at southern China rail station

People look on as police officers investigate at the scene after a knife attack at a railway station in Guangzhou, Guangdong province on May 6, 2014. -- PHOTO: REUTERS 
People look on as police officers investigate at the scene after a knife attack at a railway station in Guangzhou, Guangdong province on May 6, 2014. -- PHOTO: REUTERS 
Members of a Chinese SWAT team (right) walk past cleaners (left) removing the blood stains at the scene of a knife attack on the square of Guangzhou railway station in Guangzhou, in southern China's Guangdong province on May 6, 2014. -- PHOTO: AFP
People look on as medical personnel (centre) treat the injured people at the scene of a knife attack at a railway station in Guangzhou, Guangdong province on May 6, 2014. -- PHOTO: REUTERS
Workers clean the pavement at the scene of a knife attack on the square of Guangzhou railway station in Guangzhou, in southern China's Guangdong province on May 6, 2014. -- PHOTO: AFP
A man, whom local media say is a suspect, is detained after a knife attack at a railway station in Guangzhou, Guangdong province on May 6, 2014. -- PHOTO: REUTERS
Members of a Chinese SWAT team stand guard on the square of Guangzhou railway station after a knife attack outside the station in Guangzhou, in southern China's Guangdong province on May 6, 2014. Six people were wounded in a knife attack at a railway station in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou on Tuesday, police said, the latest in a series of such assaults that have raised jitters around the country. -- PHOTO: AFP

BsEIJING (REUTERS) - Six people were wounded in a knife attack at a railway station in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou on Tuesday, police said, the latest in a series of such assaults that have raised jitters around the country.

Police gave no reason for the attack, but China's nervousness about Islamic militancy has grown since a car burst into flames on the edge of Beijing's Tiananmen Square in October and 29 people were stabbed to death in March in the southwestern city of Kunming.

The government blamed militants from the restive far-western region of Xinjiang for both those attacks.

Resource-rich and strategically located Xinjiang, on the borders of central Asia, has for years been beset by violence blamed by the Chinese government on Islamist militants.

Guangzhou police "arrived quickly on the scene" on Tuesday and shot one of the attackers.

The official Nanfang Daily said another suspect had been caught by police after fleeing the scene.

"After verbal warnings were ineffective, police fired, hitting one male suspect holding a knife, and subdued him," Guangzhou police said on an official microblog.

They did not identify the attackers.

City newspaper the Guangzhou Journal wrote on its microblog that the attackers carried half-metre (20-inch) knives, wore white clothes, including white hats, and launched their assault as passengers were leaving the station.

Some other reports on Chinese media outlets' microblogs said there were four attackers in total.

The official Guangzhou Daily, citing a store owner who witnessed the violence, said the suspects squatted on the ground next to his shop for about two hours, covering their baggage with clothing.

They suddenly let out a shout, pulled out knives from their bags, and began attacking people, it said on its microblog. Police were on the scene within on minute and began firing warning shots, it added.

Photos circulated online in state media showed police cordoning off an empty plaza.

There was an ambulance parked there and spots of blood on the ground.

China blamed religious extremists for a bomb and knife attack at a train station in Urumqi, regional capital of Xinjiang, last Wednesday that killed one bystander and wounded 79.

The government called the attackers "terrorists", a term it uses to describe Islamist militants and separatists in Xinjiang who have waged a sometimes violent campaign for an independent East Turkestan state.

Exiles and many rights groups say the real cause of the unrest in Xinjiang is China's heavy-handed policies, including curbs on Islam and the culture and language of the Muslim Uighur people.

Beijing is unhappy at the US State Department's 2013 country reports on terrorism, published last month, which said China's cooperation on fighting terrorism "remained marginal" and that the Chinese provided scarce evidence to prove terrorist involvement in incidents in Xinjiang.

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