Pakistan struggles with how to regulate religious schools
The killing of 134 children in a Peshawar school renewed concerns about Pakistan’s unfinished agenda of uprooting militancy and intolerance.
On December 21 authorities arrested several suspects, but the identities of the seven Taliban terrorists involved is not yet clear. They are assumed to be graduates of some of the country’s manymadaris (plural of madrassa in Arabic) who wanted revenge for the Pakistani army’s ongoing military operations in Waziristan. The Peshawar school served the children of army officers.
Leaders of Wafaq ul Madaris Al- Arabia—an umbrella body of seminaries—condemned the terrorist act. Yet these clerics now fear the government will crack down on the seminary system.
