One boy student was killed and 64 more pupils were injured in a stampede happening in a primary school in Aksu City, 1,000 km away from Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, on Monday, local sources said.

The accident took place at around 9:30 AM when the guard bar of the stairway connecting the first and second floors of the school building in a primary school collapsed as pupils rushed down from classrooms on the second floor to attend a regular flag-raising ceremony held on the playground on Monday morning.

All the injured were rushed to two local hospitals.

The primary school is attached to the No. 2 Middle School of the No. 1 Farming Division, Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps.

(Xinhua News Agency October 18, 2005)