Summary

  • Officials say more than 140 people, mostly children, have been killed in a Taliban attack on an army-run school in north-west Pakistan

  • Pakistan's security forces say their operation has now ended, with all seven attackers killed

  • Some pupils, who escaped, earlier said the gunmen went from classroom to classroom, shooting children indiscriminately

  • The Taliban say the assault is in response to army operations in North Waziristan and the Khyber area. All times GMT

Live Reporting

Yaroslav Lukov, Alastair Lawson, Kerry Alexandra, Julia Macfarlane, Sally Taft and Jasmine Coleman

  1. 'Beating the children'

    A physics lab assistant at the school, Mudassir Awan, described how the attack unfolded: "As soon as the firing started, we ran to our classrooms. A party was being held for classes nine and ten and so a small number of children were there. On the upper floor, exams were being held for classes eleven and twelve... I saw the attackers. There were six or seven men. They were entering every class and they were beating the children."

  2. Tweet us

    in Pakistan tweets: Talked to my cousin who is Surgeon in LRH says "My heart is going out, all children are targeted on their chests like snipers have attacked"

  3. map

    The attack is taking place in Peshawar, the largest city in northwest Pakistan, with a population of around four million people. The Taliban have stepped up attacks in recent years in the north-west close to the border with Afghanistan.

  4. Aamer Ahmed Khan, editor of the BBC Urdu Service, says the schoolchildren are all believed to be under the age of 15. Those injured have been taken to Peshawar's Lady Reading Hospital.

  5. Amber Rahim Shamsi

    tweets: KPK Health minister tells @BBCUrdu that 23 have died in the attack on army-run school in Peshawar, incl 1 guard and 1 teacher

  6. Our correspondent says the army-run school is on a main road in northern Peshawar with a number of other schools on.

  7. Shaimaa Khalil
    BBC News

    says a member of the Taliban called a BBC journalist and said it was their men who went into the school.

  8. A school worker and a student interviewed by the local Geo TV station said the attackers had entered the Army Public School's auditorium, where a military team was conducting first-aid training for students.

  9. The army says most of the school's 500 students have been evacuated.

  10. Screengrab of TV footage showing injured boy after Peshawar school attackAP

    Local television images showed injured children being rushed away for treatment.

  11. Schoolchildren cross a road as they move away from a military run school that is under attack by Taliban gunmen in Peshawar, 16 December 2014Reuters

    Schoolchildren are pictured moving away from the school as it comes under attack from Taliban gunmen.

  12. The militants purportedly claimed the attack was an act of revenge for fighters killed in an ongoing military offensive against Taliban strongholds near Peshawar.

  13. Some 500 students are believed to have been at the Army Public School. It is not clear how many have been taken hostage.

  14. At least 20 people, 15 of them children, have reportedly been killed and others taken hostage in an assault by five or six militants wearing security uniforms.

  15. Welcome to the BBC's live updates on the storming of an army-run school in the Pakistani city of Peshawar by Taliban gunmen.