Taliban gunmen stormed a university in northwestern Pakistan on Wednesday, killing at least 19 people and triggering a heavy gunbattle with police and army troops who rushed to the scene in a town near the city of Peshawar, officials said. Later reports put the death toll at 30.
The brazen assault harked back to a December 2014 Taliban attack on a school in Peshawar that killed more than 150 people, mostly children, and shocked the nation.
Wednesday’s attack began shortly after the Bacha Khan University opened for classes in the town of Charsadda, some 35 kilometers (21 miles) outside Peshawar, said Deputy Commissioner Tahir Zafar.
As police and soldiers rushed to the campus, the attackers traded gunfire with the troops and several explosions were heard from the area of the university.