French President Emmanuel Macron said he would push for European Union regulation to ban social media for children under the age of 15 after a fatal stabbing at a school in eastern France, the latest such violent attack that left the country reeling.

Macron said in an interview late on Tuesday that he hoped to see results within the next few months.

"If that does not work, we will start to do it in France. We cannot wait," he told the France 2 public broadcaster, hours after a fatal stabbing at a middle school in Nogent, Haute-Marne.

Police questioned a 14-year-old student on Tuesday over the knifing of a 31-year-old school aide during a bag search for weapons.

The suspect "is a young man from a family where both parents work, who does not present any particular difficulties", Education Minister Élisabeth Borne said at the scene in Nogent.

"The young people are shocked," Borne said. "They are also very shocked to see that one of their classmates could commit such a horrific act. And this classmate was very well integrated in the middle school."

The incident follows a similar tragedy in April, when a student stabbed four classmates in western France, killing one.

Prime Minister Francois Bayrou on Tuesday said the government plans to test adding security gates at schools and to introduce more controls, especially on the internet, to prevent minors from buying blades.

Bayrou told parliament the incident was not an isolated case. Macron said social media was one of the factors to blame for violence among young people.

Writing on social media platform X after the interview, Macron said such regulation was backed by experts. "Platforms have the ability to verify age. Do it," he wrote.

Macron's comments come amid a wave of measures in countries around the world aimed at curbing social media use among children.

The attack came on the same day that a gunman in Austria killed at least nine people at a secondary school in the southern city of Graz. Police did not publicly identify the suspect, but Austrian media cited unconfirmed reports as saying he was a former pupil.

Australia last year approved a social media ban for under-16s after an emotive public debate, setting a benchmark for jurisdictions around the world with one of the toughest regulations targeting Big Tech.

Although most social media do not allow children under 13 to use their platforms, a report by Australia's online safety regulator found children easily bypass such restrictions.

France has been shocked by attacks on teachers and pupils by other schoolchildren amidst a general rise in youth crime. In April, a student killed a girl and wounded several other pupils in a stabbing spree in the western city of Nantes.

Reports of bladed weapons in schools have jumped by 15 percent in the last year, according to government figures released in February. The education ministry said 6,000 checks in schools resulted in the seizure of 186 knives between March 26 and May 23.

(With inputs from Reuters, agencies)