Peshawar school attack perpetrator arrested by Pak military

Peshawar: One of the main perpetrators of the Peshawar school massacre who was disguised as an internally displaced person, was arrested today, the Pakistani military said.

Taj Mohammad, 27, was the commander of the second group that attacked Army Public School. The second terrorist group involved was led by Atiqur Rehman alias Usman, who has already been captured by security forces, according to an Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR) spokesman. Mohammad is a resident of Sippah in Khyber's Koi Chowk Bara.

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He was disguised as an internally displaced person (IDP) in the village of Pawakai in Peshawar, Dawn reported. Muhammad said he was a member of Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and admitted his involvement in numerous other terrorist activities around Peshawar and North Waziristan, the report said.

Previously, the army had claimed to have made key arrests in connection with the school attack and said that all those involved, except six suspects, had either been killed or captured. "The gang involved in the APS attack...comprised of 27 terrorists, 12 of whom have been arrested in Pakistan and Afghanistan, nine have been killed and six are at large," Director General ISPR Maj Gen Asim Bajwa had previously said.

Pakistani Taliban militants attacked an army school in Peshawar on December 16 killing 150 people, mostly children. Following the attack, government and political parties expressed a renewed resolve to fight terrorism in the country. Pakistan has resumed executions after lifting moratorium in the wake of attack at the Peshawar school massacre.