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 A senior Pakistani Taliban commander claimed responsibility for
the assault in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province but an official spokesman
later denied involvement, calling the attack "un-Islamic".
The violence nevertheless shows that militants retain the ability to
launch attacks, despite a country-wide anti-terrorism crackdown and
a military campaign against their strongholds along the lawless
border with Afghanistan.
A security official said the death toll could rise to as high as 40
at Bacha Khan University in the city of Charsadda. The army said it
had concluded operations to clear the campus six hours after the
attack began and that four gunmen were dead.
A spokesman for rescue workers, Bilal Ahmad Faizi, said 19 bodies
had been recovered including students, guards, policemen and at
least one teacher, named by media as chemistry professor Syed Hamid
Husain.
Many of the dead were apparently shot in the head execution-style,
TV footage showed.
 The militants, using the cover of thick, wintry fog, scaled the
walls of the university on Wednesday morning before entering
buildings and opening fire on students and teachers in classrooms
and hostels, police said.
Students told media they saw several young men wielding AK-47 guns
storming the university housing where many students were sleeping.
"They came from behind and there was a big commotion," an unnamed
male student told a news channel from a hospital bed in Charsadda's
District Hospital. "We were told by teachers to leave immediately.
Some people hid in bathrooms."
CONTRADICTING CLAIMS
The gunmen attacked as the university prepared to host a poetry
recital on Wednesday afternoon to commemorate the death anniversary
of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, a popular ethnic Pashtun independence
activist after whom the university is named.
Vice Chancellor Fazal Rahim told reporters that the university
teaches over 3,000 students and was hosting an additional 600
visitors for the poetry recital.
Umar Mansoor, a senior Pakistani Taliban commander involved in the
December 2014 attack on the army school in Peshawar, claimed
responsibility for the Charsadda assault and said it involved four
of his men.
He told Reuters by telephone the university was targeted because it
was a government institution that supported the army.
However, later in the day, official Taliban spokesman Muhammad
Khorasani issued a written statement disassociating the militants
from attack, calling it un-Islamic.
 "Youth who are studying in non-military institutions, we consider
them as builders of the future nation and we consider their safety
and protection our duty," the statement said.
The reason for the conflicting claims was not immediately clear.
While the Taliban leadership is fractured, Mansoor is believed to
remain loyal to central leader Mullah Fazlullah.
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The Pakistani Taliban are fighting to topple the government and
install a strict interpretation of Islamic law. They are loosely
allied with the Afghan Taliban who ruled most of Afghanistan until
they were toppled by a U.S.-backed military action in 2001.
By afternoon on Wednesday, the military said all four gunmen had
been killed.
"The operation is over and the university has been cleared,"
Pakistan army spokesman General Asim Bajwa said.
A security official close to the operation said he had seen the four
gunmen's bodies riddled with bullets. He said none of the gunmen was
wearing a suicide vest but carried guns and grenades.
RUMORS OF ATTACK
Television footage showed military vehicles packed with soldiers
driving into the campus as helicopters buzzed overhead and
ambulances lined up outside the main gate while anxious parents
consoled each other.
Shabir Khan, a lecturer in the English department, said he was about
to leave his university housing for the department when firing
began.
"Most of the students and staff were in classes when the firing
began," Khan said. "I have no idea about what's going on but I heard
one security official talking on the phone to someone and said many
people had been killed and injured."
Several schools had closed early at the weekend around Peshawar, the
capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, after rumors circulated of a possible
attack.
The area has been on edge since the December 2014 massacre by six
gunmen in Peshawar.
Pakistan, which has suffered from years of jihadist militant
violence, has killed and arrested hundreds of suspected militants
under a major crackdown launched afterwards.
The Peshawar school attack was seen as having hardened Pakistan's
resolve to fight militants along its lawless border with
Afghanistan.
"We are determined and resolved in our commitment to wipe out the
menace of terrorism from our homeland," Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif
said in a statement after Wednesday's attack.
(Additional reporting by Saud Mehsud. Writing by Tommy Wilkes and
Kay Johnson; Editing by Nick Macfie)
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