A series of explosions outside the provincial headquarters of the ruling Chinese Communist Party in northern Shanxi province on Wednesday killed at least one person and injured eight others, official media and local residents said.
The blasts rocked Yingze Street in Shanxi's provincial capital, Taiyuan, at the height of the morning rush hour, the official Xinhua news agency quoted police sources as saying.
Eyewitnesses reported seeing heavy smoke and flames billowing from a minivan surrounded by debris after the explosions, which came nine days after a fatal car crash described by authorities as a "terrorist attack" in Tiananmen Square and three days ahead of a highly anticipated meeting of top party leaders in Beijing.
Police have sealed off the area and have launched an investigation into the blasts, which are believed to have been caused by home-made explosives, Xinhua said.
"The accident is suspected to be caused by self-made bombs as steel beads were scattered at the scene," it quoted its own reporter as saying.
"The explosions went off at 7.40 a.m.," an eyewitness surnamed Zhang told RFA's Mandarin Service on Wednesday. "When they went off, I was just getting off the bus at the Yingze Bridge East bus stop."
"I thought it was firecrackers, because there were several blasts, but I was a bit frightened, and everyone was looking around to see where the explosions had come from," Zhang said.
"I heard some people were injured, and I saw a lot of people milling around, and they sealed off the area."
"It sounded like really big fireworks," he said.
The blasts shattered the windows in the nearby provincial Party headquarters, according to another eyewitness, Li Maolin.
"I saw a lot of rubble on the ground, and glass from cars damaged in the explosions," Li said, adding that the blasts came from bombs "hidden in roadside flower-beds."
"There were iron ball-bearings and nails inside them, three inches long, and a tree was blown down, with a trunk a foot thick," he said.
"The nails were driven two-thirds of the way into [the wood]," Li said, adding that five panes of glass inside the Party offices had shattered.
Bid for public attention
Meanwhile, posts on popular social media sites said the blasts were likely a bid for public attention from an aggrieved citizen, as they weren't designed to cause maximum death or injury.
An employee who answered the phone at the Huanghe Gallery across the street said she also assumed the blast was linked to a failed bid to petition the authorities over official wrongdoing.
"People often go to petition the provincial Party committee, and they block the road and the gates," she said.
"But this is the first time we've had an explosion."
An official who answered the phone inside the Shanxi provincial Party committee offices said the building was operating as normal.
"We are all at work as usual," he said. "This took place on the street outside, and has no relation to us in the inner courtyard."
An official at the Shanxi provincial government propaganda department said police are investigating the blasts.
"We will make further announcements in a timely manner, as we are aware that there is a lot of interest in this matter," he said.
Social tensions
Activists say a series of blasts in public places in China in recent months are symptomatic of deep social tensions and injustice that have no immediate solution.
Last month, authorities in Beijing handed down a six-year jail term to a disabled man who set off an explosion at the city's international airport, sparking anger over what many said was an unjust sentence.
The sentence was handed down by the Chaoyang District People's Court in Beijing to Ji Zhongxing, who says he was crippled in an act of police brutality in 2005.
Chinese authorities have kept up a "stranglehold" on petitioners and rights activists in recent years, subjecting thousands to arbitrary detention in labor camps and unofficial "black jails," rights groups say.
China's army of petitioners—many of whom pursue complaints against the government over forced evictions, wrongful detention, physical attacks, and deaths in custody—are increasingly targeted by police and officials for punishment.
Many of those who pursue official complaints against government wrongdoing in their hometowns have done so to no avail for several years, some for decades. Many are middle-aged or elderly people with little or no income.
Reported by Xin Lin for RFA's Mandarin Service, and by Wen Yuqing for the Cantonese Service. Translated and written in English by Luisetta Mudie.