China: About 5,750 people prosecuted for school bullying in last 17 months

About 5,750 people have been prosecuted for school bullying in China in the last 17 month, highlighting a growing menace of ragging in the Chinese educational institutions, an official said on Monday. The prosecutors have approved the arrests of 3,407 people, Shi Weizhong, chief of the department for juvenile prosecution of China's Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP) told reporters.

Referring to four instructive cases on school violence released by the SPP last December, he said the juveniles could resort to legal defence when facing school bullying, and that in accordance with the law anyone could intervene for the protection of juveniles, state-run Xinhua news agency reported. More than 17,300 prosecutors are currently serving as vice principals in charge of security issues at schools nationwide, 3,096 of whom are chief prosecutors, he said.

Their participation was aimed at maintaining rule of law in schools and to improve the awareness among teachers and students, he said. The awareness programme covered 57,000 schools with 38 million teachers and students receiving positive feedback, he said.