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Four Cornell College instructors in treatment after 'serious incident' in China • Iowa Capital Dispatch [1]

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Date: 2024-06-11  

A suspect has been apprehended in an incident where four Cornell College instructors, one of whom is the brother of Iowa Rep. Adam Zabner, were injured Monday during a visit to a public park in Jilin City, China.

The instructors from the Mount Vernon college were teaching at Beihua University as part of a partnership between the two universities, Cornell College President Jonathan Brand said in a statement. They were injured in a “serious incident” during a trip to the park where they were accompanied by a faculty member from Beihua University. No students were involved in the program, Brand said.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said in a Tuesday press conference that none of the instructors are in critical condition, and while investigation into the incident is still being conducted, early assessments indicate it was an isolated incident.

The Associated Press reported Tuesday that Jilin City police have detained a suspect in the stabbing, a 55-year-old with the surname Ciu. According to a police statement, Ciu was walking through a park Monday when he bumped into a foreigner, after which he stabbed that individual and three others.

David Zabner, Adam Zabner’s brother and a PhD student at Tufts University who was in China as part of the partnership, was wounded in the arm during the altercation, the representative said in a social media statement. The lawmaker indicated David was “recovering from his injuries and doing well,” and that he had thanked Beihua University for its warm welcome and the local hospital for the care it showed him.

“My family is incredibly grateful that David survived this attack,” Adam Zabner said in his statement. “We’d like to see David home in Iowa as soon as possible.”

The representative also thanked the State Department and Iowa’s federal delegation, who he said are also working hard to bring the instructor home. U.S. Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks posted on social media that she and her office are in contact with an Iowa family involved in the incident, as well as the State Department and U.S. Consulate in China, to make sure the victims are receiving quality care and to work on plans to return them to the U.S.

U.S. Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns said on social media he is “angered and deeply troubled” by the incident, and he and others are doing what they can to support the victims.

Cornell College, located in Mount Vernon, began its partnership with Beihua University in 2018, according to a news release from the time, in which the Chinese college would provide funding for Cornell College instructors to live and teach in China over a two-week period. Instruction would touch on computer science, math and physics.

Jian said in the press conference that China is thought of as one of the safest countries in the world, and this incident won’t have an impact on “people-to-people exchanges” between China and the U.S.

“We have and will continue to take effective measures to keep all foreign nationals safe in China,” Jian said in the press conference.

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