Unknown assailants have blown up a school in northwestern Pakistan as government troops engage in battles with militants in the tribal region bordering Afghanistan.
Suspected Taliban-linked militants destroyed a higher secondary school building in the early hours of Saturday by detonating explosives in the Mohmand tribal region, which borders Afghanistan's Kunar province, a Press TV correspondent reported on Saturday.
There were no reports of casualties since the school was empty at the time of the blast, local officials said.
A total of 74 schools have been destroyed in the Mohmand tribal region in recent months, according to officials.
The militants have banned female education in the northwest Pakistan valley of Swat, depriving more than 40,000 girls of schooling. The number of girls enrolled in school has dropped dramatically in the region due to the violence.
Hundreds of schools have been destroyed during the past years, especially in the areas near Swat Valley and the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, previously known as the North-West Frontier Province.
The militants have destroyed more than 200 schools in the Swat Valley alone during a two-year campaign by Tehrik-e Taliban's Swat chief Maulana Fazlullah.
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