Gunshots fired at girls’ school in Charsadda after knife-wielding attackers try to scale walls

Three attackers opened aerial fire near two schools in the Shabqadar area of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Charsadda district on Thursday. No loss of life or property has been reported.

One of the schools was a public girls’ school, while the other was a private school.

Announcements were made at local mosques calling for help against the attackers.

Local media quoted District Police Officer Charsadda Shafiullah Khan as saying that the attackers had escaped from the scene after retaliatory firing by area residents. The attackers fled the scene on foot.

“Some men were trying to climb the boundary wall of a private school and on seeing them, the school guard opened fire after which the men fled,” Shafiullah Khan told AFP.

“Two men who had knives on them jumped over the wall of Charsadda Government High School No 3 for girls at noon after tearing off gauze wires that covered the school windows,” Nazakat, who is a school teacher, told a local media.

Sources said panic prevailed in the neighbourhood and a large contingent of police have cordoned off the area. Army and police personnel are conducting a search operation in the area.

The incident of aerial firing have caused alarm among area residents and security forces as the first anniversary of the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan attack on Peshawar’s Army Public School draws nearer.

The Dec 16 attack last year left at least 150 people, many of whom were children, dead, as TTP men stormed the army-run school in retaliation for the Army’s action against militants in the area.

A man suspected of involvement in the attack was arrested by Italian police and handed over to the Federal Investigation Agency earlier today (Thursday).