A 17-year-old Korean student will appear in court tomorrow after a teacher at Auckland's Avondale College was stabbed in front of a class of about 20 students shortly before midday.
David Warren, 49, who was teaching Japanese, had turned his back on the class to write on a whiteboard when he was stabbed in the back with a knife.
The Korean student was arrested at an address in Blockhouse Bay about an hour later. He had been followed to the property by police patrol cars and the police helicopter.
He was caught as he tried to flee on a motor scooter. He was wrestled to the ground and handcuffed before being led away.
He will appear in Auckland District Court tomorrow charged with wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm.
Police said Mr Warren's injuries were not life-threatening and he was likely to be discharged from hospital this evening.
The school went into lockdown after the stabbing with pupils shut away in safe rooms, including the school squash courts.
The arrested student is understood to have been in the country for only a few weeks, and his parents are overseas.
Avondale College principal Brent Lewis told a media conference the stabbing was an isolated incident, and that international students were an important part of the school.
He described the incident as "an aberration, and such a bizarre incident".
All students who witnessed the stabbing had been interviewed by police, and had been offered counselling.
Mr Lewis said students had been asked not to speak to the media, and the college would continue as normal tomorrow.
Police Inspector Cornell Kluessien said it was "quite unusual" for a stabbing to occur in a New Zealand school.
Education Minister Anne Tolley phoned Mr Lewis after the incident to offer support, and the local Mt Albert MP, former prime minister Helen Clark, visited the college.
An Avondale College student, Manaola Kaumeafaiva, 14, was stabbed to death outside the college in October 2006, after a hip-hop competition organised by a church.
Petani Fa'avae, 16 at the time, was found guilty of murder and jailed for life with a minimum parole period of 11 years.
Prime Minister John Key was today meeting Korean President Lee Myung-Bak in Auckland, and afterwards told NZPA he was shocked by the stabbing.
"This is somewhat alarming ... but we need to understand whether it's an isolated incident out of left field or whether something a bit more serious is going on," he said.
"If it's an isolated incident, we will have to find out the mental state of the student involved.
"I understand he is a foreign student so we will have to look at the implications of that.
"We're literally earning billions of dollars from foreign students who are coming to study in New Zealand."
There were 32,000 law-abiding, honest and trustworthy Koreans living in this country and it was important not to tarnish the reputation of a large group of foreign students who were coming to study in New Zealand, or indeed the Korean people, because of the actions of one person.
"It is possible to get a random individual who is suffering from some sort of mental condition who undertakes an action which is totally reprehensible," Mr Key said.
"There's been issues with foreign students in the past and we've worked hard to try and improve the conditions around them and the partial care that we give those students who come to New Zealand."
