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| Malala Yousafzai makes tearful return to Pakistan for first time since Taliban shooting | |
| (about 11 hours later) | |
| The Nobel peace laureate Malala Yousafzai has made a tearful return to Pakistan in her first visit to her native country since she was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman in 2012 for advocating education for girls. | |
| Yousafzai, travelling with her father and younger brother, met the prime minister, Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, in the capital, Islamabad, before giving a brief speech on national television. | |
| “It’s the happiest day of my life. I still can’t believe it’s happening,” she said, wiping away tears. I don’t normally cry … I’m still 20 years old but I’ve seen so many things in life,” she added. | |
| Yousafzai spoke of the importance of education and about the efforts of her charitable foundation to help girls, often switching between English and the Pashto and Urdu languages. | |
| “Welcome home,” Abbasi told Yousafzai. “When she went away, she was a child of 12. She has returned as the most prominent citizen of Pakistan.” | |
| It was Yousafzai’s first visit to her homeland since she was airlifted to Britain six years ago for medical treatment. But she was unlikely to travel to her home region of Swat, in mountains north-west of Islamabad, due to security threats against her, a relative and security sources told Reuters. | |
| “It’s been long-held desire of Malala Yousafzai and her parents to visit Swat and see her relatives and friends. But she was not given permission due to security concerns,” said one relative, who declined to be identified. | |
| Precise details of her itinerary have been kept secret in view of the sensitivity surrounding the visit, a government official said of the trip, which is expected to last four days. | |
| When Yousafzai arrived in Pakistan capital, she was escorted through Benazir Bhutto airport under tight security, according to photographs broadcast on local television. | |
| Yousafzai has become a global symbol for human rights and a vocal campaigner for girls’ education since a gunman boarded her school bus in the Swat valley on 9 October 2012, asked “Who is Malala?” and shot her. | |
| She was treated for her injuries in Birmingham, where she completed her schooling. Winner of the Nobel peace prize in 2014, Yousafzai has continued her campaigning while pursuing her studies at Oxford University. | |
| Malala Yousafzai | Malala Yousafzai |
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