Serial Blasts Reported Outside China’s Communist Party Office In Taiyuan In Northeastern Shanxi Province

Serial blasts occurred on Wednesday in front of the provincial headquarters of the Communist Party of China, or CPC, in Taiyuan, the capital of northeastern Shanxi province, killing one person and injuring eight others, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

The blasts in Taiyuan, which is located more than 500 kilometers (310 miles) southwest of Beijing, took place at about 7:40 a.m. local time (6:40 p.m. EDT on Tuesday), and is suspected to have been caused by “self-made bombs,” Xinhua said.

Police cordoned off the area and fire engines were seen at the site of the explosions, the report said, adding that authorities have launched an investigation into the incident. The report did not provide further details.

The explosions occurred close on the heels of an incident at the historic Tiananmen Square in central Beijing on Oct. 28, when a vehicle ploughed through bystanders and caught fire, killing three people in the car and two tourists.

Authorities said the Tiananmen Square incident was a “terror attack” perpetrated by Uighurs, a predominantly Muslim Turkic-speaking minority population, in western China’s troubled Xinjiang region.