128 students have been killed, with four other dead and over 245 injured, including faculty members and students, as Taliban gunmen took hundreds of students and teachers hostage in a gunfire attack on a the military-run Army Public School on Warsak Road. The death toll of 132 people has been confirmed by various television channels.
Heavy gunfire was heard from inside the school as soldiers surrounded it around 11 am local time on Tuesday. Helicopters swooped overhead and a fleet of ambulances ferried wounded children to hospital.
The Lady Reading Hospital in Peshawar said the hospital had received the bodies of three students and was treating 28 injured students and two male teachers.
“Many are in the operation theater now in critical condition, undergoing treatment,” said hospital official Ejaz Khan.
Military officials at the scene said at least six armed men had entered the military-run Army Public School. About 500 students and teachers were believed to be inside.
“We were standing outside the school and firing suddenly started and there was chaos everywhere and the screams of children and teachers,” said Jamshed Khan, a school bus driver.
A teacher said that the attackers targeted the school while exams were taking place.
“After half an hour of the attack, the army came and sealed the school,” a teacher told a private television channel outside the besieged school.
“We were in the examination hall when the attack took place,” he said. “Now the army men are clearing the classes one by one.”
A ruling party-member of provincial assembly Shaukat Yousafzai says the militants were wearing military uniform and entered the school from the back side.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif flew into Peshawar to personally monitor the operation, the PM office in Islamabad said.
Army Chief General Raheel Sharif is also proceeding to Peshawar to review the situation, army spokesman Maj Gen Asim Bajwa confirmed.
Taliban spokesman Muhammad Umar Khorasani has stated that his group was responsible for the attack.
“Our suicide bombers have entered the school, they have instructions not to harm the children, but to target the army personnel,” he said.
“It’s a revenge attack for the army offensive in North Waziristan,” he said, referring to an anti-Taliban military offensive that began in June.
“Six of our fighters successfully entered the army school. We were giving them instructions from outside,” the Khorasani added.
“We will target every institution linked to the army unless they stop operations and the extra-judicial killing of our detainees,” he said.
“Our detainees are being killed and their bodies are thrown on roads,” Khorasani claimed.
“We had issued them instructions to our armed men not to harm small children even if they are the sons of either senior military or civilian leaders,” the TTP spokesman said.
According to the ISPR all six militants involved in the attack have been killed by the security forces. The Nation
