Three days of mourning starts for 132 children murdered by the Taliban

 
School children in New Delhi observe a silence after the attack in Peshawar in which 132 children lost their lives
Kiran Randhawa17 December 2014

Mass funerals were underway in Pakistan today after Taliban gunmen stormed a school murdering 132 children and nine teachers.

Hundreds of grief-stricken relatives crowded coffins strewn with flowers and candlit vigils were held across the nation to mark the start of three days of mourning.

Pupils as young as six were among those who lost their lives at the Army Public School in Peshawar yesterday - the deadliest terrorist attack in the country’s history.

Harrowing eyewitness accounts revealed how students were forced to watch as bodies of their teachers were burned beyond recognition.

Other survivors told how they played dead while the nine insurgents, wearing suicide vests, scoured the school looking for victims, before firing indiscriminately.

Pakistan’s Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif today reinstated the death penalty for terrorism cases as shocking images of the scene of the atrocity emerged, including a blood-stained stage in the auditorium.

Overnight, the body of the school principal, Tahira Kazi, was found among the debris from the rampage. She was allegedly set alight in her office, which was reduced to rubble.

It is believed she was targeted because she was married to a retired army colonel, Kazi Zafrullah.

A further 121 students and three staff members were wounded.

One survivor, 13-year-old Ehsan Elahi, said he was in the auditorium when he heard gunfire nearby. Seconds later the attackers burst in and started “spraying bullets like hell”.

Pakistani school boys hold a banner reading in Urdu 'We condemn Peshawar incident and will continue our struggle for education'

He said: “Our teachers asked us to calm down but the sound of the bullets started came closer and closer. In the next minute, the glass of windows and doors of the hall were smashed with bullets. Some people started kicking the hall doors.’

He said that situation created panic among the 100 students in the hall.

Photographers film the aftermath of where over 100 schoolchildren where murdered

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He added: “Everybody was trying to find a place to hide. The students were crying and weeping. There were only chairs and benches to hide behind in the hall. I jumped behind a bench and laid on the ground.”

“I saw many of my friends getting bullets on their heads, chests, arms and legs right in front of me.”

Another account revealed how a female teacher was burned alive as she courageously stood in the path of the terrorists and told her children to run for their lives.

Afsha Ahmed, 24, confronted the gunmen when they burst into her classroom and told them: “You can only kill my students over my dead body.”

Upturned chairs and blood stains in the aftermath of the shooting

The militants doused her with petrol and set her alight.

One of her students, 15-year-old Irfan Ullah, wept as he recalled her incredible bravery.

He said: “She was a hero, so brave.

“She jumped up and stood between us and the terrorists before they could target us.”

Tahira Kazi was burnt alive in front of her students

Army commandos fought the gunmen in a day-long battle until the school was cleared and the attackers dead.

Akhtar Hussain, whose son was killed in the attack, said: “They finished in minutes what I had lived my whole life for, my son.” Tears streamed down his face as he buried his 14-year-old, Fahad.

Devastation: Mrs Kazi's office, where a terrorist blew himself up during a nine-hour rampage

“That innocent one is now gone in the grave, and I can’t wait to join him, I can’t live anymore,” the labourer added.

The Taliban said the attack was revenge for a military offensive against their safe havens in the northwest, along the border with Afghanistan, which began in June.

The massacre led to calls for the death penalty to be restored. “It was decided that this moratorium should be lifted. The prime minister approved,” said government spokesman Mohiuddin Wan.

Indian children observe two-minutes of silence at a school in Bhopal

The attack drew swift condemnation from world leaders. Prime Minister David Cameron said the slaughter was “deeply shocking” while US President Barack Obama called for “peace and stability”.

Pakistan’s teenage Nobel Peace laureate Malala Yousafzai - herself a survivor of a Taliban shooting - said she was “heartbroken” by the bloodshed.

One expert suggested the horrific attack could have been in retaliation to the 17-year-old winning this year’s Nobel Peace Prize.

Peshawar School Shootout

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Ahmed Rashid, an expert on the Islamic militants, said the insurgents had various reasons to attack the school - one of which was to send a message to Malala’s supporters.

The Taliban has previously warned that Malala had forged a pact with “Western satanic forces”.

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