QUETTA, Pakistan — Survivors of an overnight attack that killed 61 people at a Pakistani police academy described chaotic scenes of gunfire and explosions, with militants shooting anyone they saw and cadets running for their lives and jumping from windows and rooftops.
A Taliban splinter group and an affiliate of the Islamic State group made competing claims of responsibility for the four-hour siege late Monday at the Police Training College on the outskirts of the southwestern city of Quetta.
Most of the dead and the 123 wounded were recruits and cadets, said Wasay Khan, a spokesman for the paramilitary Frontier Corps. Of the three militants who carried out the attack, two blew themselves up with explosive vests and the third was killed by army gunfire, he added.
As the nation reeled and sought to understand how militants were able to carry out such violence, many Pakistanis were reminded of a bloody 2014 attack by the Taliban on an army-run school in Peshawar in which more than 150 people, mostly children, were killed.
Broadcasters on Tuesday showed the aftermath of the attack on the Quetta academy: scorched windows and floors littered with the shoes of the dead and wounded.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and the army chief Gen. Raheel Sharif rushed to the scene to meet with survivors, who spoke of the horrors of the surprise attack on about 700 cadets, trainees, instructors and other staff that began about 11:30 p.m.
While most of the casualties were from the academy, some of the soldiers who responded to the assault also were killed, said Shahzada Farhat, a police spokesman in Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan province.
The Islamic State group posted a claim of responsibility on the group’s media arm. The claim was not confirmed by Pakistani officials and Islamic State did not offer any previously unknown details about the attack.
A little-known breakaway faction of the Pakistani Taliban, called the Hakimullah group, also claimed responsibility.
In addition, Maj. Gen. Sher Afgan said the attackers were most likely from the banned militant group Lashker-e-Jhangvi Al-Almi, which is affiliated with al-Qaida and the Taliban.
