Charsadda (Pakistan): At least 30 people were massacred on Wednesday by Kalashnikov-wielding Taliban suicide attackers who stormed a prestigious university here in restive northwestern Pakistan and opened indiscriminate fire, in a grim reminder of the 2014 Peshawar Army school attack.
The gunmen entered the Bacha Khan university, named after iconic leader Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan alias Bacha Khan in Charsadda, some 50 km southwest of Peshawar in the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, and opened fire on students and teachers in classrooms and hostels, the police said.
Four militants were also killed as security forces retaliated, bringing the death toll to 30 in the grisly attack. The militants used the cover of thick, wintry fog to scale the walls of the university before entering buildings.
Blasts and heavy gunfire were heard from inside the campus where a poetic symposium was in progress to mark the death anniversary of Bacha Khan who died on January 20, 1988.
There were about 3,000 students and 600 guests on the campus when the attack took place, vice-chancellor of the university Dr Fazal Rahim said.
Federal information minister Pervaiz Rashid visited the university and told the media that the operation launched by security forces to clear the campus has been completed.
He said the attack was in response to a military operation in the province which has broken the back of the militants. A professor, two students and four security guards were among the dead, authorities said. Army spokesman Lt Gen Asim Bajwa tweeted that four terrorists were killed during operation launched by security forces to clear the university.
