Summary Army officials on the ground have briefed the military leader about the situation
CHARSADDA (Dunya News/AFP) – Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Raheel Sharif has paid a visit to Bacha Khan University after an attack claimed twenty lives, Dunya News reported Wednesday.
The Army Chief also visited a hospital were the injured were shifted to for treatment. General Sharif inquired about conditions of the injured students.
#COAS visited Bacha Khan University,met with LEAs/troops who carried out op.Grieved over tragic loss.Appreciated timely response from Psr-1
— AsimBajwa (@AsimBajwaISPR) January 20, 2016
#COAS just visited Charsada hosp.Said,Our heart goes out to bereaved families of shaheeds for this irreparable loss.Also met all injured-2
— AsimBajwa (@AsimBajwaISPR) January 20, 2016
At least four militants entered the university in early hours today taking advantage of fog. Indiscriminate firing claimed at least twenty lives including a professor.
Army officials on the ground have briefed the military leader about the situation and the counter-operation. Corps Commander and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Governor are accompanying General Sharif.
The attack had echoes of a Taliban assault on an army-run school in Peshawar in December 2014 that killed more than 150 people, most of them children.
"There are male and female staff members and students on the campus," university vice chancellor Fazal Raheem Marwat said, adding he had been on his way to work when he was informed of the attack.
"There was no announced threat but we had already beefed up security at the university."
Naik Mohammed, security chief at the university, said the attackers had entered close to a campus guest house.
The 2014 assault in Peshawar was Pakistan s deadliest ever attack, and prompted a crackdown on extremism in the country.
After a public outcry, the military intensified an offensive in the tribal areas where extremists had previously operated with impunity.
Pakistan s Jinnah Institute said in a report released Tuesday that the National Action Plan (NAP) helped curb extremist violence last year, although targeted attacks against religious minorities spiked in the Muslim nation of some 200 million people.
On Tuesday, a suicide attack at a market on the city s outskirts killed 10 people, in addition to the bomber.
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