The attack started with seven gunmen 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. Eyewitnesses described how students cowered under desks as dead
bodies were strewn along corridors.
During a 3-hour orgy of bloodshed, seven jihadists claimed at least 141 lives before themselves being killed.
The massacre was also said to be an act of revenge against the Pakistani army, which has been attempting to suppress the Pakistani Taliban in their north Waziristan tribal homelands over the past few months
The horror at school came on the day when the military was scheduled to provide a display of first-aid and drills. The wives of a brigadier and a major were searched out and murdered
The corridors of the city's Combined Military Hospital were lined with dead students, their green-and-yellow school uniform ties peeping out of white body bags.
- 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
- Insurgents had ‘inside information’ before carrying out well-planned attack
- Taliban accepted responsibility for the attack, claiming it 'was just a trailer'
- Afghan Taliban criticised 'killing of innocent children' as against principles
- In a statement, Afghan Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said: 'Killing innocent children is against the principals of Afghan Taliban and we condemned. Our thoughts are with the families of those who lost their loved ones.'
About the school
The school
on Peshawar's Warsak Road at the centre of yesterday's massacre was
established in 1992 for boys and girls of both military personnel and
civilians.
Although
it was originally founded in 1992, within two years, it had rapidly
grown into a large institution with hundreds of students extending from
primary through to high school.
It was in 1994 that it was formally registered within the Army Public Schools and Colleges System (APSACS).
It was popular with students for its extra-curricular clubs - these included journalism, sports and debating programmes.
Students were tweeting its motto - 'I shall rise and shine' - in a show of solidarity with those killed.
It is just one of 22 schools throughout the Peshawar region that are part of the APSACS chain.
Nationwide, there are 146 of these institutions, with 134,296 registered students and almost 8,000 teachers on the books.
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