Bomb explodes near US embassy after a woman tries to set herself on fire
A 26-year-old young man from Inner Mongolia was arrested in connection with the blast. The would-be self-immolator is a woman in her 40s, possibly a petitioner. For the police, the bomb was fireworks, which injured the author’s hands. The words "American Embassy" were blocked and censored on social media.
Beijing (AsiaNews) – A man set off a bomb a few metres from the US Embassy in the Chinese capital. This came shortly after a woman tried to set herself on fire with petrol but was dragged away by two plainclothes policemen. It is not known whether the two incidents are connected.
According to the US Embassy, the bomb exploded at 1 pm. The police identified the author as a certain, Jiang, a 26-years-old man from Inner Mongolia. It also said that the blast was caused by fireworks.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang called the event an isolated incident, noting that the police were handling it. At the same time, the words "American Embassy" were censored on Weibo, the Chinese equivalent of Twitter.
According to eyewitnesses, the young man had two detonators in his hands. The small blast injured both hands.
The US Embassy is located next to the intersection of Tianze and Anjialou Roads, Chaoyang district, and is almost always crowded with people queuing to apply for a visa to the US.
The work at the embassy was suspended for a few hours, then resumed.
Earlier in the day, at about 11 am, a couple of hours before the bomb explosion, a woman in her 40s covered herself in petrol and tried to set herself on fire.
Self-immolation is often used by young Tibetans demanding the return of the Dalai Lama to Tibet and denouncing Chinese repression in the Himalayan region.
The woman was taken away by two policemen in plain clothes as another two rushed to the site with fire extinguishers.
Some witnesses said that the shabbily dressed woman held a sign in her hand with the Chinese characters for "grievance". It is commonplace for people to file complaints and present petitions to central government authorities.
Conversely, violent attacks are rare in the Chinese capital, given the tight surveillance network that envelops the city.
The worst such incident dates back to 2013 when someone drove a car into people, killing five, in the highly monitored Tiananmen Square. At the time, the Chinese police blamed Xinjiang Uyghur separatists for the attack.
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