INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
UN Secretary General called on Pakistan to prioritise measures to deter future attacks on schools.United Nations: Armed groups in Pakistan
continue to recruit children, including those from madrassas, and allegedly use them for suicide attacks, according to a UN report released
today.The annual report of the UN Secretary-General on Children and Armed Conflict said the Pakistan-based terror outfits have released
videos of children being taught how to carry out suicide attacks."In Pakistan, the United Nations continued to receive reports of the
recruitment and use of children, including from madrasas, and allegations of the use of children by armed groups for suicide attacks," said
the report covering the January-December 2017 period."In January, Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan released a video showing children, including
girls, being instructed how to perpetrate suicide attacks," it said.UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said he was "concerned" by the
continued attacks on schools by armed groups, particularly the targeting of girls' education.He called on the Pakistan government to
prioritise measures to deter future attacks on schools.The report also said while the age-disaggregated data on civilian casualties were
limited, incidents of children killed and injured in attacks in Pakistan by armed groups continued to be reported.It cited the February
suicide attack in Sehwan in the Sindh Province in which at least 75 people, including 20 children, were reportedly killed.Eight attacks on
educational facilities and students were also reported, four targeting girls' education, it said.In March, unidentified individuals
vandalised the Oxford Public School in Ghizer Valley in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir's Gilgit-Baltistan region, and threatened to bomb the
school if female teachers did not cover themselves.In the same month, a girls' school located in Qila Abdullah in Balochistan was damaged in
an attack through the use of improvised explosive devices, it said.Taliban terrorists stormed military-run Army Public School in the
northwestern city of Peshawar in December 2014, killing at least 150 people, mostly children.
