A schoolgirl who survived a classroom explosion that killed at least 42 people in east China said yesterday she and other pupils had been forced to make firecrackers in the school for the past four years.
Villagers living around the elementary school in Jiangxi province ridiculed an official explanation that Tuesday's blast was the work of a deranged suicide bomber. The government-run Xinhua news agency said a villager nicknamed "Psycho" by his neighbors set off the blast which flattened four classrooms, backing up an account by Premier Zhu Rongji.
But schoolgirl Gao Yun, 13, said her school building doubled as a fireworks factory, as punishment for children who did not work hard enough.
"We started to make firecrackers in the school four years ago, once or twice a week," said Gao, who was slightly injured in the explosion.
"Pupils in high grades make the barrels and those in low grades attach the fuses," she told a reporter by telephone.
Officials in Wanzai county say the practice is common in the poor, mountainous area, famous for its fireworks. They blame a cutback on central government support for education, which forces schools to fund themselves.
Parents in the village also dispute the official death toll.
Xinhua said 42 children and teachers died, but parents said as many as 60 were dead -- four of them teachers, the rest children.
Xinhua said a villager named Li Chuicai, 33, broke into a third-grade classroom carrying two bags stuffed with firecrackers which he detonated, killing himself and bringing the school crashing down.
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