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School in Russia’s Siberia reopens after teenager’s axe assault on teacher, classmates

Repairs at the class, where the attack took place, began on Monday and would be completed in a one week time

ULAN-UDE, January 22. /TASS/. A school in a village of the Siberian republic of Buryatia has reopened and resumed classes after a teenager assaulted last week a teacher and his classmates, school’s director Sergey Razuvayev told TASS on Monday.

"The education process has been resumed and the classes are on the schedule," Razuvayev said adding that repairs at the class, where the attack took place, began on Monday and would be completed in a one week time.

According to a TASS correspondent, law enforcers are checking identification documents upon the entrance to the village, while military police and the director with teachers are meeting students at the school’s lobby. The room, where the tragedy took place, has been closed due to investigative efforts.

Early on January 19, a 9th grade student of a school in the Sosnovy Bor village, near Ulan-Ude, the capital of Siberia’s Buryatia republic, attacked students with an axe and then set the class on fire with a Molotov cocktail.

Seven people - six students and one teacher - were injured and hospitalized. The attacker was rushed to hospital under police escort and a criminal investigation has been launched.

This was the second violent attack on a school in Russia within a week. On January 15, two teenagers staged a knife attack at a school in Russia’s Urals city of Perm.

They came to the building bearing knives, entered a room where junior students were having a class and deliberately stabbed 12 children and their teacher. The attackers also wounded each other and were taken to hospital. They later tried to commit suicide but both are alive now.

Last week’s reports suggested that the attacker of a school in Siberia’s Buryatia was allegedly a member of a closed social networking group and could be linked to the attackers of schools in other regions.

Russian Deputy Communications Minister Alexey Volin told TASS last Friday that social networking groups calling for attacks at schools using cold weapons would be immediately blocked.