By IANS,
Lahore : Educational institutions across Pakistan’s Punjab province were closed Tuesday due to “unsatisfactory security arrangements” for students as the army continued its assault against the Taliban in South Waziristan.
The institutions that were reopened Monday have been shut again over security concerns, Geo News reported Tuesday.
According to the provincial home ministry, some of the private schools and colleges were issued directives Tuesday morning to stop working due to unsatisfactory security arrangements for students.
Strict security measures have been adopted in and around government-run education institutes in Punjab and students are being allowed entry only after thorough checking via metal detectors, witnesses said.
Schools in the Pakistani capital and those located in Sindh and Punjab provinces were reopened Monday. They had been shut following a spate of terror attacks in the country.
Institutions in the restive North West Frontier Province will remained closed till Nov 1.
Over 170 people have been killed in the latest wave of militant violence, which started with a suicide bombing at the offices of the UN World Food Programme in Islamabad Oct 5. Five employees of the agency were killed.
The most audacious attack came on Oct 10 when 10 terrorists in military uniform laid siege to the Pakistan Army’s General Headquarters in Rawalpindi. At least 19 people, including nine raiders, died in the 22-hour standoff. One militant was arrested.
On Oct 15, gunmen wearing suicide vests stormed two police academies and the offices of Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency in Lahore. A car bomber struck at a police station in the northwestern town of Kohat. At least 38 people including 11 insurgents were killed in a single day.
A twin suicide bombing Oct 20 at the International Islamic University here killed seven people.
On Oct 22, Brigadier Moinuddin Ahmed, who was the head of the UN peacekeeping mission in Sudan, was gunned down in Islamabad along with another soldier.
A day later, 25 people were killed and 27 injured in a series of blasts across Pakistan. Eighteen people died in a landmine explosion in Mohmand Agency while seven were killed when a suicide bomber struck at an air force base in Attock district. Eight people were injured in a bombing outside a restaurant in Peshawar.