Pakistan official: 126 people dead, 122 injured in attack on school
ISLAMABAD Tue Dec 16, 2014 6:01am EST
(Reuters) - At least 126 people were killed and 122 injured on Tuesday in an attack by Taliban militants on a Pakistani high school, a provincial official said.
"It may rise," said Bahramand Khan, director of information for the Chief Minister's Secretariat.
He said more than 100 of the dead were school children.
(Reporting By Katharine Houreld; Editing by Mike Collett-White)
Pakistani military: four Taliban killed at school, search continues
ISLAMABAD Tue Dec 16, 2014 6:01am EST
(Reuters) - The Pakistani military said four Taliban militants had been killed at a school they attacked in the city of Peshawar on Tuesday, and that they were searching for remaining gunmen.
"Remaining clearance in progress," the military said in a tweet.
The Taliban say they sent in six gunmen with suicide vests to attack the military-run children's school.
(Reporting By Katharine Houreld; Editing by Mike Collett-White)
Pakistan army: special forces rescue two children, two staff members at school
ISLAMABAD Tue Dec 16, 2014 6:30am EST
(Reuters) - The Pakistani military said on Tuesday that special forces had rescued two more children and two staff members at a school that has been under attack from Taliban gunmen for around five hours.
A tweet for the military also said a fifth militant had been killed.
The Taliban said they sent six gunmen wearing suicide vests to attack the school. The military is clearing the school of gunmen.
(Reporting By Katharine Houreld; Editing by Mike Collett-White)
‘Our classmates were shot in front of us… I felt bullets flying past my head’: Boy aged 10 recounts horror of seeing friends gunned down in Pakistani school slaughter as Taliban fighters massacred more than 100 children
Gunmen in Peshawar entered school and started shooting at random
One terrorist blew himself up in a classroom containing 60 children
Teacher set on fire in front of pupils, with the children forced to watch
Army commandos quickly arrived at the scene and exchanged fire
School was stormed by six gunmen in military fatigues, it was reported
160 children being held hostage, with four terrorists killed by the army
Taliban accepted responsibility for the attack, claiming it 'was just a trailer'
The terrorist group said three suicide bombers were part of the attack
David Cameron described the attack on the school as 'deeply shocking'
The massacre is the worst ever in the deeply troubled region
By Ted Thornhill for MailOnline and Imtiaz Hussain In Peshawar For Mailonline and Aamir Iqbal and Corey Charlton for MailOnline and Ian Birrell
Published: 08:23 GMT, 16 December 2014 | Updated: 12:50 GMT, 16 December 2014
A 10-year-old boy caught up in the Peshawar school massacre has spoken of his dramatic escape from Taliban gunmen as bullets whizzed past his head - having seen two of his classmates shot in front of him.
At least 126 people have been killed in the attack, more than 100 of them children, after Taliban gunmen stormed a military school in the north-western Pakistani city of Peshawar, in the worst ever militant attack to hit the troubled region.
Irfan Shah was sitting in his class at 10:30 when he heard the sound of firing outside.
He told MailOnline: 'It was our social studies period. Our teacher first told us that some kind of drill was going on and that we do not need to worry. It was very intense firing. Then the sound came closer. Then we heard cries. One of our friends open the window of the class.
'He started weeping as there were several school fellows lying on the ground outside the class.
'Everybody was in panic. Two of our class fellows ran outside class in panic. They were shot in front of us.'
He said that the teacher asked the children, part of a class of 33, to run towards the back gate of the school.
The attack started with the gunmen entering the 500-pupil school - which has students in grades 1-10, thought to be ages 5 to 14 - in the early hours
A Pakistani girl, who was injured in the attack, is rushed to a hospital in Peshawar
A hospital security guard helps a student injured in a shootout at a military school in Peshawar
Pakistani security forces takes up positions on a road leading to the Army Public School
Ambulances drive away from the military run school, which was attacked by the Taliban in the early hours
School was stormed by six gunmen in military fatigues , it was reported
A Pakistani soldier takes up a position above a road near the school
He continued: 'The back gate is around 200 meters from our class room. I tightly held the hand of my friend Daniyal and we both ran towards the back gate. We were weeping. I felt bullets passing by my head twice. It was so terrible.
'We reached back gate in a minute. As we stepped outside the gate, we started weeping again very loudly. An aunt from a nearby house heard us and took us inside her house. We were shivering. She gave us water and comforted us. We stayed there for 15 minutes.
'Our van always parked a few hundred meters away from the school. We then went to our van. The van driver told us that our school fellows who have been murdered in the attack are martyrs and they would go to jannah (paradise).
'We have been told that two of our class fellows died in the attack. They both were shot in front of all of us.'
It was reported that one suicide bomber blew himself up in a room containing 60 children and a teacher was set on fire in front of pupils, with the children forced to watch.
The attack started with six gunmen, disguised as security guards, entering the 500-pupil school - which has students aged 10 to 18 - in the early hours.
The jihadists shot their way into the building and went from classroom to classroom, shooting at random and picking off students one by one.
Army commandos quickly arrived at the scene and exchanged fire with the gunmen. Eye-witnesses described how students cowered under desks as dead bodies were strewn along corridors. News images of the aftermath of the attack showed boys in blood-soaked school uniforms with green blazers being carried from the scene.
Around 160 children, aged 13 and 14, are being held hostage. A police inspector earlier said they had trapped the terrorists in the principal's office but this has now been demolished. Many of the soldiers involved in the rescue operation are trying to save their own children.
The Pakistani military claims that it has killed four of the militants, with special forces soldiers having engaged the terrorists for the past few hours.
'We selected the army's school for the attack because the government is targeting our families and females,' said Taliban spokesman Muhammad Umar Khorasani. 'We want them to feel the pain.'
Mudassar Abbas, a physics laboratory assistant at the school, said some students were celebrating at a party when the attack began.
'I saw six or seven people walking class-to-class and opening fire on children,' he said.
Mudassir Awan, an employee at the school, said he saw at least six people scaling the walls of the building, but initially thought little of it.
'We thought it must be the children playing some game. But then we saw a lot of firearms with them,' he said.
'As soon as the firing started, we ran to our classrooms. They were entering every class and they were killing the children,' he added.
One of the wounded students, Abdullah Jamal, said he was with a group of 8th, 9th and 10th graders who were getting first-aid instructions and training with a team of Pakistani army medics when the attack began.
When the shooting started, Mr Jamal, who was shot in the leg, said nobody knew what was going on in the first few seconds.
THE PAKISTAN TALIBAN: A HISTORY OF SLAUGHTER
Over 1,000 schools have been destroyed by the Pakistan Taliban since 2010, but today's massacre isn't just the worst atrocity carried out on a school, but on any target.
In May 2010, members of the organisation stormed two mosques packed with worshippers, throwing grenades and indiscriminately opening fire. The ensuring shootout and hostage situation left 94 dead and more than 120 injured.
Up to 2,000 worshippers were thought to have been in the two mosques in Lahore, Pakistan's second city, when the two groups of at least seven gunmen and three suicide bombers struck as traditional Friday prayers ended.
In June this year, the Pakistan Taliban killed 29 people in a terrifying siege on Karachi Airport when ten gunmen dressed as Airport Security Force officials stormed Terminal One.
Armed with automatic rifles and rocket-propelled grenades, they triggered a gun battle that raged for 10 hours and left dozens dead and wounded.
Afterwards, the group claimed the attack was revenge for the death of its leader Shahidullah Shahid. It was believed they militants intended to destroy or hijack aircraft before they were stopped by the security personnel and commandos.
Angered at US drone strikes on its mountain retreats, in June last year a group of Taliban gunmen slaughtered 10 tourists at the base of Nanga Parbat, in an attack that sent shockwaves through the climbing community.
The gunmen were wearing uniforms used by the Gilgit Scouts, a paramilitary police force that patrols the area. They abducted two local guides to find their way to the remote base camp - one of which was killed in the shooting.
The Taliban has also attempted to enforce its opposition to women's rights to education through violence. In January last year, five female teachers were massacred when militants ambushed a van transporting them home from their jobs at a community centre.
The teachers and two health workers - one man and one woman - were killed in the conservative Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province when the militants on motorcycles opened fire with automatic weapons.
It was in this region that a Taliban gunman shot 15-year-old Malala Yousufzai in the head last October for criticizing the militants and promoting girls' education. Last week she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
However, the bloodshed in Pakistan pales in comparison to the violence perpetrated by the neighbouring Afghanistan Taliban.
Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, the organisation has been held responsible for several massacres in the cities of Kabul and Mazar-i-Sharif that left thousands dead.
'Then I saw children falling down who were crying and screaming. I also fell down. I learned later that I have got a bullet,' he said, speaking from his hospital bed.
'All the children had bullet wounds. All the children were bleeding,' he added.
Bahramand Khan, director of information for the regional Chief Minister's Secretariat, said at least 126 people were killed and 122 wounded.
'It may rise,' he said, adding that more than 100 of the dead were school children. A local hospital said the dead and wounded it had seen were aged between 10 and 20 years old.
Troops surrounded the building and an operation was underway to rescue children still trapped inside, the army said.
Hours into the siege, at least three explosions were heard inside the high school, and a MailOnline journalist at the scene said he heard heavy gunfire.
A security official speaking on condition of anonymity said two helicopter gunships are on site, but had been prevented from firing on the militants because students and teachers remain inside the building.
Outside, as the helicopters rumbled overhead, police struggled to hold back distraught parents who were trying to break past a security cordon and get into the school.
Akhtar Ali, who works out for the UN, was weeping outside.
He told MailOnline: 'My 14-year-old niece Afaq is inside the school. I don't know if she is alive or dead. I am desperate. I am just waiting in hope. It is agony. '
'My son was in uniform in the morning. He is in a casket now,' wailed one parent, Tahir Ali, as he came to the hospital to collect the body of his 14-year-old son, Abdullah.
'My son was my dream. My dream has been killed.'
MailOnline spoke to Naveed Ahmed, who works at the irrigation department. He said: 'My son Hasid Asmad is 16-years-old, is still inside the school., He took a mobile and called me while I was in the mosque, he was praying down the phone. I have been waiting so many hours for news. My son told that he was being kept safe by the Pakistan army inside. They are taking a picture of them to prove they are safe.
'They have told me that the children are safe in the custody of the army.'
Mrs Humayun Khan, one of the mothers of a student, said with tears in her eyes: 'No body is telling me about my son's whereabouts... I have checked the hospital and he is not there. I am really losing my heart. God forbid may he's not among the students still under custody of terrorists.'
A student who survived the attack said soldiers came to rescue students during a lull in the firing.
'When we were coming out of the class we saw dead bodies of our friends lying in the corridors. They were bleeding. Some were shot three times, some four times,' the student said.
'The men entered the rooms one by one and started indiscriminate firing at the staff and students.'
Mushtaq Ghani, the spokesman for the provincial government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, told journalist Aamir Iqbal: 'At least six militants wearing military uniforms entered the school from back wall of the school that is known as 'Army Public School'.
'There is a graveyard attached to back wall of the school that is run by Pakistani Military, most of the students studying in this school were children of military officers.
'Attacking innocent children is the most abominable crime and such an attack will not be accepted at all.
'This can be the reaction of ongoing military operations against terrorists in the North Waziristan area of Pakistan.'
Student Shuja khan claimed that 'the attack took place the time a senior military officer started his address during the function that was going on inside the school'.
He added: 'I am not sure but he was the Corp Commander Peshawar who when he started his speech terrorists opened fire on the students sitting in the function.'
Horror: A school boy who was injured in the Taliban attack receives medical treatment at a hospital in Peshawar
Relatives of a student, who was injured during the attack, comfort each other outside Lady Reading Hospital in Peshawar
An armored personnel carrier moves toward the school
Pakistani army troops arrive to take on the Taliban attackers
Taliban gunmen stormed a military school in the north-western Pakistani city of Peshawar
A school boy who was injured in the Taliban attack receives medical treatment at a hospital in Peshawar
Taking no chances: Pakistani security forces form a perimeter around the school
A soldier escorts schoolchildren after they were rescued from the Army Public School
Mohammad Khorasani, the spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban group - known as Tehrik-i-Taliban - accepted responsibility for the attack.
He said: 'It's a gift for those who thought they have crushed us in their so called military operation in North Waziristan.
'They [the Pakistani military] were always wrong about our capabilities, We are still able to carry out major attacks. Today was just the trailer.
'Six of our Mujahideen, including three suicide bombers took part in this attack and with the grace of almighty they all executed the plan very accurately.
'We selected the army's school for the attack because the government is targeting our families and females. We want them to feel the pain.'
Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif called the massacre a 'national tragedy' and is on his way to the area.
Prime Minister David Cameron today said the Taliban attack on the military school was 'deeply shocking'.
'It's horrifying that children are being killed simply for going to school,' he said.
Education campaigner and Nobel peace prize winner Malala Yousafzai, who was shot by the Taliban, has condemned the 'atrocious and cowardly' attack on a school in Pakistan. She said: 'I am heartbroken by this senseless and cold-blooded act of terror in Peshawar that is unfolding before us.'
WHY THE PAKISTANI TALIBAN PREFERS 'SOFT TARGETS'
The school on Peshawar's Warsak Road is part of the Army Public Schools and Colleges System, which runs 146 schools nationwide for the children of military personnel and civilians. Its students range in age from around 10 to 18.
The schools educate the children of both officers and non-commissioned soldiers and army wives often teach in them.
TTP spokesman Muhammad Khorasani told AFP there were six attackers.
'They include target killers and suicide attackers. They have been ordered to shoot the older students but not the children,' he said.
'This attack is a response to Zarb-e-Azab and the killing of Taliban fighters and harassing their families.'
Zarb-e-Azb is the official name for the army's offensive against strongholds of the Taliban and other militants in North Waziristan.
The military has hailed the operation as a major success in disrupting the TTP's insurgency, which has killed thousands of Pakistanis since it erupted in 2007.
More than 1,600 militants have been killed since the launch of Zarb-e-Azb in June, according to data compiled by AFP from regular military statements.
Talat Masood, a retired general and security analyst, said the attack was intended to weaken the military's resolve.
'It is both tactical and strategic. The militants know they won't be able to strike at the heart of the military, they don't have the capacity because the army are prepared,' Masood told AFP.
'So they are going for soft targets. These attacks have a great psychological impact.'
The semi-autonomous tribal areas that border Afghanistan have for years been a hideout for Islamist militants of all stripes - including Al-Qaeda and the homegrown TTP as well as foreign fighters such as Uzbeks and Uighurs.
Washington pressed Islamabad for years to wipe out the sanctuaries in North Waziristan, which militants have used to launch attacks on Nato forces in Afghanistan.
People carry the casket of a victim of the Taliban attack, after receiving it from a local hospital in Peshawar
Prime Minister David Cameron today said the Taliban attack on the military school was 'deeply shocking'
Details were sketchy in the unfolding situation and it was unclear what was going on inside the school and if any of the students were taken hostage
Mohammad Khorasani, the spokesman for Pakistani's Taliban Fazal Ullah group, accepted responsibility for the attack
A man talks on a phone, with his arm around a student, during the attack
A plainclothes security officer escorts students rescued from a nearby school
Schoolchildren cross a road as they move away from the military run school
Pakistani rescue workers take out students from an ambulance injured in the shootout
Taliban gunmen took hundreds of students hostage in this military-run school
Heavily armed Pakistani troops arrive at the scene
The Pakistani Taliban have targeted security forces, checkpoints, military bases and airports, but attacks on civilian targets with no logistical significance are relatively rare.
In September, 2013, dozens of people, including many children, were killed in an attack on a church, also in Peshawar.
Meanwhile, Russell Brand faced an online backlash after accusing the U.S. of terrorism as the attack in Pakistan unfolded.
The comedian posted on Twitter a link to a YouTube video in which he speaks to former Guantanamo Bay detainee Moazzam Begg.
Alongside the link he tweeted: 'The people who do 'terror' best are the people who decide what 'terror' is.'
But others on the microblogging website reacted angrily to the self-styled revolutionary, who uses the handle @rustyrockets.
They highlighted how his tweet coincided with news that more than 100 children had been killed in the Taliban assault.
Nate Anderson wrote: 'Bad timing given what's just happened in Pakistan dude. Bad bad timing'.
Colin Wright, a professor of International Relations, added: '@rustyrockets you do talk some crap at times. Not all the time but I'm seeing more and more of it. You tweet this while Pakistan unfolds.'
Another Twitter user Mark Lott wrote: 'I guess you haven't seen the news from Pakistan today yet. @rustyrockets'.
Brand's interview with Moazzam Begg appears to have taken place at his flat in Hoxton, east London.
The YouTube video was titled: 'CIA Torture - Guantanamo Bay Prisoner Lifts Lid: Russell Brand The Trews (E211)'.
Begg, from Birmingham, was held by the U.S. government in Bagram, Afghanistan, and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, after being arrested in Pakistan in 2002 and was released without charge in 2005.
Russell Brand recently faced criticism on Twitter when he tweeted the mobile phone number of a reporter who had requested an interview.
School children rescued from the attack are taken away by Pakistani soldiers
The Peshawar school massacre came as Pakistani Taliban insurgents launched a massive attack in Afghanistan's eastern Kunar province.
Thousands of militants crossed the border from Pakistan and stormed Dangam district, forcing local security to call in the help of the Afghan National Army, who have so far killed 18 insurgents and wounded 28 others during intense firefights.
About 2,000 insurgents are involved in the battle said Kunar province's police chief, Abdul Habib Saidkhail, who added that almost of those killed or injured were of Pakistani origin.
The Pakistani Taliban is an ally of the better known Taliban over the border in Afghanistan, but operates as an entirely separate organisation.
In September the Pakistani Taliban declared its support for the Islamic State and vowed to send fighters to assist the terror group as it was wages bloody war in Syria and Iraq.
'Oh our brothers, we are proud of you in your victories. We are with you in your happiness and your sorrow,' Pakistani Taliban spokesman Shahidullah Shahid said in a statement issued to mark the Muslim holy festival of Eid al-Adha.
'In these troubled days, we call for your patience and stability, especially now that all your enemies are united against you. Please put all your rivalries behind you,' he added.
'All Muslims in the world have great expectations of you. We are with you, we will provide you with Mujahideen [fighters] with every possible support,' he said.
PAKISTAN WAS BRACED FOR BLOOD THIRSTY ATTACK BUT HIS HORRIFYING ASSAULT ON INNOCENTS IS A SIGN OF TALIBAN WEAKNESS
Pakistan has been braced for this kind of bloodthirsty attack. It is the savage response to a military crackdown on the group's tribal heartlands, which claims to have wiped out hundreds of militants.
Yet it is also a reaction to shifting geopolitics in the region since the election of a new president in Afghanistan, which threatens the Taliban even in its traditional stronghold. Analysts say the sickening slaughter of schoolchildren symbolises its sudden weakness.
For years Islamabad resisted attacking the fanatics in North Waziristan, on the north-west frontier with Afghanistan. Both countries blamed their neighbours for harbouring terrorists - with strong justification.
But in recent months Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), the militant's umbrella group that has killed thousands of people in Pakistan, has come under new pressure.
First a US drone strike killed long-haired leader Hakimullah Mehsud late last year - and successor has struggled to hold together the organisation as it came under fierce attack.
Splits have been evident with some senior figures pledging allegiance to the leader of Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, while others recently launched a splinter group of al-Qa'ida in the Indian sub-continent.
Bombing raids were launched from the air on the Taliban's north-western strongholds in February. These were followed four months later by Operation Zarb-e-Azb, which has since killed more than 1,600 militants.
The recent election of Ashraf Ghani as president of Afghanistan, combined with improved relations between Islamabad and Washington as well as with Kabul, has made life tougher for the terrorists on both sides of the border.
Over the past fortnight there have been a series of counter-insurgency assaults on the Taliban in Afghanistan. On one day this month a US drone killed nine leading militants and a senior commander captured by US troops in Afghanistan was handed over to Islamabad.
'This is something new - Afghanistan and Pakistan seem to have finally realised they have a common enemy,' said Gareth Price, senior research fellow with Chatham House think tank. 'Lashing out at schoolchildren in this way is a sign of weakness.
The TTP made it clear this horrific attack in Peshawar was a response to the military operation and the wiping out of its fighters.
There have been other recent outrages in reaction to the assaults on its heartland. In June ten militants armed with rifles, rocket-propelled grenades and suicide bomb vests mounted a raid on Karachi airport that left 28 people dead and damaged several planes.
Talat Masood, a retired general and security analyst, said this latest attack was designed to weaken military resolve. 'They are going for soft targets,' he said. 'These attacks have a great psychological impact.'
Although Pakistan has long worried about cracking down on militants, fearing the kind of bloodbaths as seen in Karachi and Peshawar, its operations have led to a substantial fall in the number of terrorist attacks in the country.
Yet Naveed Ahmad, an investigative journalist and security analyst, said the country had been expecting a backlash. 'These people have been looking for an opportunity and the trouble is our security is so superficial, which makes it easier for them.
'No-one is ever held accountable for the security failures. So we saw no-one fired after the airport attack, for instance.'
Others queried whether even this attack on a school, killing scores of innocent pupils, will change attitudes.
Two months ago 17-year-old Malala Yousafzai - shot in the head by Taliban militants - became the youngest winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for her campaigning on female education. Yet the honour received scant mention in much of the Pakistan media, criticism from prominent figures in the country and scathing attacks on social media.
