Pakistan Charsadda: Gun battle at Bacha Khan university. 20 Feared Dead In Pakistan University Attack, Firing Lasted 2 Hours (Photos)

Security forces in north-west Pakistan are battling militants inside a college in the town of Charsadda, with at least five deaths.

Security forces deployed around the university

The army said four gunmen had been killed but others were thought to be holding out in Bacha Khan University as shooting continued.

Some students have been rescued, Deputy Inspector General Saeed Wazir said. At least three people were injured.

More than 130 students were killed at a school in nearby Peshawar in 2014.

Picture Credit Reuters

Charsadda is about 50km (30 miles) from the city. It appears the attackers set off explosions when they stormed the university at around 09:30 local time (04:30 GMT) on Wednesday.

Police and soldiers, backed by armoured vehicles, surrounded the campus and an evacuation got under way. An emergency official, Bilal Faizi, told AFP news agency he had seen five dead bodies, all with bullet wounds.

According to BBC News. an unnamed rescue official was quoted by other media as saying up to eight people may have been killed, not including the gunmen.

Picture Credit Reuters

An assistant professor at the university, Dr Shakoor, told the BBC that he had turned back from the main gate of the campus after being told it was under attack.

Most of the students and members of the faculty would probably still not have arrived when the attack started, he said.

Picture Credit AFP

He saw people coming out through the main gate, apparently because the attackers had entered the campus from the back, where there is a university guesthouse.

Dr Shakoor said he suspected the attack might have been targeting a poetry gathering scheduled to honour a Pashtun nationalist leader from the Partition era, Bacha Khan, after whom the university is named.

 Latest Development According to NDTV

1. At least three students have been killed, said Deputy Inspector General Saeed Wazir to Reuters. He said that 70 percent of students had been rescued.
2. Four terrorists have been killed after the army moved into the university, according to local media reports.
3. A Pakistani minister said that at least 20 were feared killed in the attack.
4. 3,000 students were present this morning on campus along with 600 guests attending a poetry recital.
   
5. Police, soldiers and Special Forces launched a ground and air operation at the university.
6. Those who kill innocent students and civilians have no religion, said Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.
7. The militants, using the cover of thick, wintry fog, scaled the walls of the Bacha Khan University in Charsadda, in the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
8. They then opened fire on students and teachers in classrooms and hostels.
9. Television footage showed soldiers entering the campus as ambulances lined up outside the main gate and anxious parents consoled each other.
10. Pakistan, which has suffered from years of militant violence, has killed and arrested hundreds of suspected militants under a major crackdown launched after a massacre of 134 school children in December 2014 in Peshawar.
11. Four gunmen have been killed and the firing has stopped  (Last Updated 08.33am GMT)