HONG KONG — Four American lecturers from a small Iowa college were injured in a stabbing attack during an educational trip to China, according to the university and officials from both countries.
Attacks on foreigners are unusual in China, a powerful security state, but it is seeking to repair ties with the United States and revive tourism to jump-start a flagging economy after three years of isolation due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Four instructors at Cornell University, a private liberal arts college in Mount Vernon, Iowa, were injured in a “serious accident” while visiting a public park during the day, university president Jonathan Brand confirmed in a statement Monday.
They were accompanied by faculty from the school’s Chinese partner institution, Beihua University, during the attack in the northeastern Chinese city of Jilin.
Mr Brand said the school was in contact with all four and was providing support.
A shocking video circulating on social media shows a woman and two men, one of them covered in blood, lying on the ground in Beishan Park in central Jilin province, home to several ancient temples.
All three were conscious and were using or reaching for their cell phones while people nearby looked on.
A State Department spokesman said U.S. authorities were aware of the reports and were monitoring the situation, but declined to comment further.
China’s Foreign Ministry acknowledged the incident on Tuesday after hours of official silence.
“All the injured were immediately taken to hospital and received appropriate treatment and their injuries are not life-threatening,” spokesman Lin Jian said at a regular news conference in Beijing. “Police have provisionally determined that this was an isolated incident and are currently conducting further investigations.”
Chinese state media, which frequently reports on Chinese victims of violence in the United States, had not reported on the attack as of Tuesday afternoon local time, and discussion of the case appeared to be heavily restricted on China’s heavily censored social media.
Hu Xijin, a prominent Chinese commentator and former editor-in-chief of the state-run nationalist tabloid Global Times, said on Tuesday he hoped this was an isolated incident that “will not have a negative impact on people-to-people exchanges between China and other countries.”
“Our people are generally very friendly towards foreign tourists who show up at our markets and tourist sites,” he said in a since-deleted Weibo post. “Whatever the motive of the perpetrator in this case, this is an isolated case in the broader context of Chinese society.”
Iowa Rep. Adam Zabner confirmed that his brother, David Zabner, was among the victims in Monday’s attack, which was a Chinese national holiday. He said his brother was stabbed in the arm and required stitches and was hospitalized but was in good spirits and feeling well.
Adam Zabner said Tufts graduate student and Cornell alumnus David Zabner, who previously lectured at the university, had participated in the exchange program before and returned this year.
Beihua University is paying Cornell professors to travel to China and live there for two weeks to teach computer science, mathematics and physics, according to a news release from 2018. Cornell said Monday that no students are participating in the program.
Calls to the joint program with Beihua University and Cornell University were unsuccessful Tuesday.
Details of the condition of the other victims, whose identities have not yet been made public, are unknown, and it is unclear whether the teachers were targeted or attacked indiscriminately.
Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds said on Twitter she was in contact with Iowa’s federal delegation and the State Department in response to “this horrific attack.”
Senator Joni Ernst (R-IA) I said it with X She said she and her team have been in contact with Cornell University and the State Department and are “wishing everyone a speedy recovery.”
Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks, a Republican from Iowa whose district includes Mount Vernon, said in a statement that she was working with the U.S. embassy to help the victims leave China as quickly as possible after they are treated for their injuries.
The attack comes as the world’s two largest economies, the United States and China, are stepping up people-to-people exchanges as part of efforts to improve overall bilateral ties, despite concerns that U.S. officials are considering relaxing a Level 3 travel advisory for mainland China, which they say could hinder those exchanges.
During a visit to the United States last November, Chinese President Xi Jinping — He has a longstanding personal connection to Iowa, having first visited the state in 1985 as part of an agricultural delegation. — Beijing said it is willing to invite 50,000 young Americans to China over the next five years for student exchange programs.
The number of Americans studying in China has fallen sharply over the past decade. There are now about 300,000 Chinese students in the United States, but fewer than 900 Americans studying in China, according to U.S. data.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin said Tuesday the stabbing incident would not affect the normal operation of U.S.-China cultural exchanges.
“China is recognized as one of the safest countries in the world,” he said. “China has been and will continue to take effective measures to ensure the safety of all foreigners in the country.”
China has some of the world’s strictest gun control laws but knife attacks are not uncommon. Last month, a knife attack at a hospital in the southwestern province of Yunnan left two people dead and 21 injured.
