PESHAWAR, Pakistan — The Taliban blew up a girls' school on Monday in northwest Pakistan, where troops are battling the militants, police said.
Islamist insurgents opposed to co-education have destroyed hundreds of schools, mostly for girls, in the northwest of the country in recent years as they wage a fierce insurgency to enforce sharia law.
The five-room government primary girls school in the town of Shabqadar was destroyed when two bombs planted by Taliban militants exploded, senior police official Mohammad Riaz Khan told AFP.
A nearby house was also damaged but there were no casualties, Khan said.
Pakistan's military is engaged in offensives against Islamist fighters across much of the northwest including the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan, a region branded by Washington as the most dangerous place on earth.
About 30,000 troops poured into South Waziristan in mid October to try and dismantle the strongholds of the Taliban leadership, enraging militants who have responded with a surge in bomb blasts and attacks.
Copyright © 2013 AFP. All rights reserved. More »
