Grief of tragic, heartbreaking APS incident is still fresh: FM Qureshi
Shah Mahmood Qureshi said the day will be remembered as the darkest in Pakistan's history.
ISLAMABAD (Dunya News) – Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, on the sixth anniversary of the deadly Army Public School (APS) attack, said the grief of the tragic and heartbreaking incident is still fresh.
The foreign minister said in his statement on Wednesday that the day will be remembered as the darkest in Pakistan’s history. He said the sacrifice of the innocent children of the APS united the entire nation.
Shah Mahmood Qureshi said the nation pays tribute to all the APS martyrs including the innocent children and is standing by the armed forces of Pakistan in fight against terrorism. We will rest only after eradicating this evil from the country, he added.
It is pertinent here to mention that on December 16, 2014, six Taliban terrorists stormed into the school and martyred nearly 150 people, including more than 130 schoolchildren. The deadliest attack in Pakistan’s history and the carnage prompted the government to declare an all-out war against terrorist outfits.
In the wake of the attack, military courts were set up for trying terrorists under amendments made to the Constitution and the Army Act.
The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) had claimed responsibility for the attack. The mastermind of the APS massacre, Umar Mansour, was killed in a drone strike in Afghanistan in 2017.
Pakistan army said that all six militants who were involved in the attack have been executed. The military courts, established soon after the attack, awarded death sentences to 310 militants and 56 of them have been executed so far, said a statement issued by the Pakistan Army.
