Splinter Taliban group threatens more school attacks

Afghan officials see Pakistan’s suggestion that Afghans are supporting cross-border attacks as an attempt to distract attention from what they say is Pakistan’s long history of supporting Afghanistan’s Taliban movement and other insurgent factions.

“We will not be safe, even parents don’t feel safe”, he said. Wednesday’s assault occurred on the anniversary of Ghaffar Khan’s death and hours before the university was to host a poetry recital in his honor to which hundreds had been invited.

The majority of those victims were children, and their relatives held a candlelight vigil in Peshawar late Wednesday for those slain in the latest attack.

Attackers entered the university buildings in the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan and opened fire at students and teachers in classrooms and hostels.

The TTP, an umbrella group, has officially disavowed the Bacha Khan attack, branding it “un-Islamic” and vowing to hunt down those behind it.

Only Bacha Khan university and its sister university Abdul Wali Khan in the town of Mardan were closed, he said.

The mastermind of the Army Public School Peshawar attack, Umar Mansoor, of the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan group claimed the attack through a post on his Facebook page, saying that four attackers were sent to the university.

Pakistani authorities have cleared a university in the northwest of the country which came under attack by gunmen. One of those receiving treatment, guard Zakir Ali has said he was the first to respond and resist when the terrorists struck.

According to another report by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism(Start), more than 3,400 terrorist attacks targeting educational institutions took place in 110 countries between 1970 and 2013. He said the university administration refused a proposal of setting up a police checkpoint on the campus, but that police patrols toured there twice a day. A security official said the death toll could rise to as high as 40.

Several Pakistani opposition politicians criticized the government’s efforts to combat militancy.

After the Peshawar attack, the government promised to set up a joint Intelligence Directorate, but that has not happened yet.

Speaking in his home village, just after his brother’s funeral, Ashfaq Hussain’s sadness was tinged with frustration.

“He could not stand the sight of blood”, he said.

Shahzad reported from Islamabad.