Malala Yousafzai, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate and human rights activist, has arrived in Pakistan to attend an international conference on girls’ education in the Muslim world. She expressed being “overwhelmed” at returning to her homeland after a long time, according to a report by the French news agency AFP on Saturday.
Malala became a global advocate for girls’ education and human rights at the age of 15 in 2012. At that time, she became a target of the Taliban for speaking in favor of girls’ education. In Pakistan’s Pashtun-dominated Swat Valley, Taliban militants shot her in the head while she was returning home from school.
Malala was critically injured and airlifted to Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, UK, for treatment. After recovering, she established the Malala Fund, a non-profit organization. In 2020, she graduated from Oxford University with a degree in Politics, Philosophy, and Economics.
Malala’s Marriage
In 2014, Malala became the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. In 2017, the United Nations appointed her as a UN Messenger of Peace. Speaking at the conference in Islamabad on Saturday, Malala said, “I am truly honored, overwhelmed, and delighted to return to Pakistan.” Her parents also accompanied her to the conference.
According to AFP, the high-profile conference in Pakistan gathered education leaders from various Muslim-majority countries. However, Afghanistan, Pakistan’s neighbor, rejected the invitation to participate. Afghanistan is the only country in the world where girls are banned from attending school.
In his opening address at the conference on Saturday, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said that Pakistan and the entire Muslim world face significant challenges in ensuring the rightful access of girls to education.
Shehbaz stated, “Denying girls their right to education is equivalent to depriving them of their voices, choices, and the right to a brighter future.” Pakistan’s Education Minister Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui told AFP that the government had invited Afghanistan to the conference. However, no representatives from the Afghan government participated.