Pakistan - University Of Peshawar In Danger

The police department has cancelled leaves of its staffers which are assigned the duty to be at the Peshawar university campus and have ordered them to remain on duty because of getting security threats to the campus.
A high-level meeting attended by SSP operations Mian Mohammad Saeed, campus police commandant Mohammad Hussain Khan and army officials on Wednesday examined the situation and decided to increase and strengthen the security.
According to the sources, there were fresh threats to various departments of the university due to which security at the campus is to be further strengthened. Recently some phone calls had been received that showed any unpleasant incident could happen at the campus in the coming few days.
More than 300 policemen deployed at the campuses of the University of Peshawar, University of Engineering and Technology, Agriculture University and Islamia College University. The administration of university already improved the security arrangements at the campus since the Dec 16 incident on Army Public School, Peshawar.
Almost every educational institution has raised boundary walls, installed barbed wire and increased the number of security guards to cope with any bad or unpleasant happening.

Leaves of varsity police cancelled “We can’t take chances. We should be prepared to cope with any eventuality. We suffered due to terrorism and have to take appropriate measure. There was no specific threat to any department or person, and such meetings were part of the routine coordination among the police, army and varsity’s administration” said campus SHO Imran Khan.

According to the sources, due to strict security measures after the APS tragedy had created problems for the people who visit the university daily as only one exit gate opposite to the Khyber Teaching Hospital is being used now. Gate-1 of Islamia College University is closed for vehicles after the incident of kidnapping of its Vice Chancellor Mohammad Ajmal Khan in 2010 and after that people are using only the gate-2 for entry.

The campus had about 52,000 students and 4,000 employees, including teachers and support staff, besides over 100 houses which were being guarded by police. According to them, the university police could not open the Islamia College Gate-1, located near the Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education office, as far as the security threats exist.

Regular visitors to the university have to go through a great deal of hassle. Every visitor coming to Islami College University enters at gate-2 and reaches the Coffee Shop from where he takes left to reach the parking area and then go to the university. All this takes about 20 minutes.

According to sources, the police were focusing on the security of campus following information suggesting that terrorists could target it.