Malala Yousafzai pictured aged 11
THE 14-year-old Pakistani girl shot in the head after being accused by Taliban extremists of ”promoting secularism” is now in the UK for medical treatment. Islamic extremists in Pakistan, meanwhile, have issued threats against local and Western media for their coverage of the shooting.
According to the New York Times, Malala Yousafzai left an air base in the garrison city of Rawalpindi, where she was being treated for head wounds in a military hospital, on an air ambulance sent from the United Arab Emirates.
In a statement, the military said she would receive immediate treatment for her head injuries. . Her skull was fractured after a bullet passed through her head, and she is to undergo long-term rehabilitation including intensive neuro rehabilitation in England.
Malala is being treated at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham in central England, a centre which has specialised in the treatment of troops wounded in Afghanistan, Prime Minister David Cameron’s office said in a statement quoted by The Associated Press.
Pakistan said it would pay for her treatment.
The BBC reported today that UK Foreign Secretary William Hague said the attack on Malala and her friends “shocked Pakistan and the world” and that her bravery was “an example to us all”.
Malala will now receive specialist medical care in an NHS hospital. Our thoughts remain with Malala and her family at this difficult time.
He added:
The public revulsion and condemnation of this cowardly attack shows that the people of Pakistan will not be beaten by terrorists. The UK stands shoulder to shoulder with Pakistan in its fight against terrorism.
The mercy flight produced a sigh of relief of sorts among Pakistanis who have kept an anxious national vigil for Malala since she was shot by a militant Islamic gunman last Tuesday as she returned from school in Mingora, the main town in the Swat Valley, in northwestern Pakistan.
The daughter of a schoolmaster, Malala had become known for her eloquent and impassioned advocacy of education and children’s rights in the face of Taliban threats, which made her a potent symbol of resistance to the militants’ extremist ideology.
Worries over her fate have dominated Pakistan in the past week. Front-page headlines have carried updates of her medical treatment, schoolchildren held prayer services and candlelight vigils, and the political system has united to condemn the Taliban with an unusual vehemence and unity.
Tens of thousands of people took to the streets of the port of Karachi on Sunday for a solidarity march organized by the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, the city’s dominant political party.
Malala’s fate has also excited much international concern. President Obama, the Nobel Peace laureate Desmond Tutu and the pop singer Madonna were among the public figures to take up her cause.
A wave of public criticism over the shooting has stung the Pakistan Taliban, which over the weekend issued threats against the local and Western news media. Some Western media organisations based in Islamabad have temporarily closed their offices as a precautionary measure.
The Pakistani government has publicly named the militant believed to have carried out the shooting as Ataullah, and has offered over $100,000 for his capture. The police in Swat rounded up more than 100 people after the shooting, but formally arrested just four. The assassin remains at large.
I thought that she had been shot by Jewish agents attempting to besmirch the image of Islam. Seems as if I got things back to front again! This doesn’t seem altogether unrelated:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2216553/International-Day-Girl-Child-2012-Devastating-images-terrifying-world-child-brides.html
These people are sick.
So the taliban, instead of realising what a fuck-up they’ve made and apologising, threaten the people that reported what they’ve done. Way to go!
Yeah, Thats allll culture. Really sad, in 1400 years islam went down hill because of idiots like these. Culture mixes in with religions (all over the world)…this is unfortunate and a disaster for religions that do not have anything to do with the violence. If the religion wasn’t there, would the violence still exist? I think yes, because in my opinion religion is an excuse, not a cause.
I digress, woman are greater than men, in my opinion greater because the world makes things so much harder for them and yet there are lots who flourish and do great things.
In May 2001 President George W. Bush gave the Taliban $43 million as part of the ‘war on drugs.’
… don’t you believe it – most of that money went on subsidising that big insurance write-off scam on 11th September that year.
To anyone who wishes to sign a petition as a show of support for this brave girl:
http://www.avaaz.org/en/petition/We_support_you_Malala/?cizAtdb
Brave Taliban warriors. One of them skulks under cover and then emerges to shoot an unarmed and unsuspecting schoolgirl in the head. Cowardly scum. The international outrage is welcome as is her coming to the UK for treatment.
Apologies for being OT, but I found this interesting.
http://aoratimelani.blogspot.gr/2012/10/i-am-here-to-stay.html
@Stonyground: “The more I see of people the better I like dogs.” Can’t remember who said this, a French aristocrat comes to mind, but looking at some pieces of news I tend to agree with her. (Present company excepted, of course.)
Madame de Stael, Broga. An interesting woman, to say the least!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germaine_de_Sta%C3%ABl
For us motorcyclists, I have an Ogri T-shirt with a cartoon and slogan that says: “The more people I meet, the more I like my dog”
I posted this earlier on the original thread, but thought it was worth re-posting here.
Well-written article about reaction to the shooting of Malala, who is apparently being flown to the UK for further treatment.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/10/14/gordon-brown-malala-s-next-fight.html
@barriejohn: I’m absolutely delighted with that link bj. Thanks so much. Just had a quick look now but I intend to read it all tomorrow.
@Angel_K: Thanks for that. I must admit I am a sucker for dogs. I’ve had a dog since I was a little boy. I meet people who don’t like dogs and, looking at the way some dogs are trained (or not trained), I can understand why. On the other hand the abuse of many dogs is chilling. I am very anti the Kennel Club and its dreadful “breed standards.”
Very OT. Sorry folks. I’m afraid my dog button got pressed and the reflex just happens.
This is truly a sad story that lifts the veil of religion = love. They are the most hateful, violent people on the planet. Education is their enemy and they know it…as to why here in the USA the religious right wing is doing everything possible to destroy our public education system.
I also heard another reason this girl was moved to Britain was to keep her safe since the nut-job fanatics promised to finish the job. Should one of the local fanatics make an attempt on this child’s life, I hope you Brits lynch the SOB and not give him the decency of a trial.
$100,000 reward from the Pakistan Government, eh? Now, where have I heard that before…
Delighted that she’ll be receiving treatment in the UK. Here’s hoping she has a superb recovery and gets to stay, if that’s her decision.
Broga,
I saw this and the follow up documentary a couple of years ago.
The Kennel Club makes Joseph Mengele look humane.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9jROjFPAis
@Carasek: If she wants to stay (and who could blame her) I hope we let her. I would much prefer it though if matters could improve dramatically in her own country so that she wanted to return. Surely that must be what we all want, for these fanatics to be on the losing side everywhere so that people everywhere don’t have to face this sort of thing.
Takes a story like this to make me painfully aware of the apathy of British parents.
Like other atheist parents, I hesitate to kick up a fuss about religious nonsense in my child’s school for fear of getting her socially isolated, yet here we see parents and a child risk their very lives for the sake of a decent education. My wife, who also wasn’t born here and had to fight for every scrap of education, came home furious the day this story broke, having just watched a colleague ring the school making excuses for a lard-arsed son, who wanted to practice his golf game instead for a junior tournament. Unlike me, my wife will hound the headteacher to within an inch of her life when our child comes home with a note saying there’s a school-trip, overseen by Scripture Union, or that she’s expected to spend December practicing for the school nativity play instead of learning, or… well you get the picture. She cannot understand why, when the vast majority of Brit parents aren’t religious, they meekly put with such nonsense, and I have no answer.
@tony e: Thanks for the link. The mystery is how the Kennel Club gets away with their policy of inflicting suffering on dogs. Shouldn’t the RSPCA, the police, the government be taking action to stop a degree of cruelty that would lead to the prosecution of the ordinary citizen? And when I see these prissie twats mincing round with their dogs it makes me puke. I think even the BBC has stopped showing their sick annual exhibition of the results of abusing dogs. The UK a country of animal lovers? Get real.
@Stuart H.
Good for your missus. She’s got it right, why do so many of us, not just with schools, but in everyday life, put up with the religious lording it over us, forcing their primitive superstitions on us, when it would seem that we are the majority.
Stuart H. I suggest part of the answer is that there is a suffocating overlay of religion which is daily poured over us. I don’t think that most parents stop to think what they are being asked to believe. And the role of the media, and particularly the BBC, the emptying churches, the clergy inserting themselves into life wherever they can, the politicians and the schools is to provide the overlay and avoid any kind of analysis.
So we have well paid military padres, NHS employed clergy, snippets of religion inserted into radio and television programmes and faith communities (part of the ludicrous Big Society) and faith schools. But there are two other seductive elements to this. Parents love to see their children appear to an audience and they don’t actually think about the claim that Mary was a virgin or the nativity a confusion of contradictions and historical innacuracies.
The other element is that the clergy are very quick to fill a gap when people need to come together. A child is killed and they will call for a meeting in church to offer prayers. For what? Asking God to change his mind? The local vicar, perhaps presiding over a near empty church, will, with no embarrasment, appear on television to represent the views of the community.
And what can they offer? When April Jones disappeared and a clergyman was asked what comfort he could offer he said, “What we do know is that wherever April is she is supported by God’s love.” No follow up questions because it would be disrespectful. How does he know that? What kind of God is he talking about?
Keep people in the dark and, at all costs, ensure that opposing and challenging views are censored. Blanket them in bullshit.
@Marky Mark: Can do. I’ll keep you posted.
Good point well made, Broga. It never ceases to amaze me how these people can continue to be given airtime and column inches to assert superstitious twaddle, unchallenged, as if it is the blindingly obvious. When will someone in the media ever have the balls to ask them to substantiate their comments?
In a similar vein, immediately after the Japanese tsunami had struck last year our local vicar apparently stood up at a community event (unfortunately I wasn’t there) to inform those present that at such times it is difficult for we mere humans to comprehend where god is when events such as that take place, or to understand why he could let such a terrible thing happen. The answer, she told everybody, was that the earthquake which triggered the devastation had nothing whatsoever to do with god and was caused by human sin. Not one single person chose to contradict her or ask if she was aware of something called tectonic plate activity. How I now wish I had chosen to go along that evening!
D’oh! That last post was supposed to read ‘Not one single person chose to contradict her or ask if she was aware of something called plate tectonics.’
Priests put into words what many feel, hope or believe. They give a focus for public emotion. They are good at it too! And as has already been mentioned, a public meeting of that sort is hardly the time and place for a debate about the existence of god or whatever.
Perhaps a non-religious organisation could offer solace, though it would be hard to compete with all the bells and smells, the awe-inspiring architecture, etc. Purely offering practical help (eg food and tents to a disaster area) is not enough. People also need to be able to express their feelings, and to feel that their suffering is being witnessed and empathized with.
The military also do these public ceremonies. They usually have a religious component but I think it could be taken out without too much difficulty.
What happens in non-religious countries?
Stuart H: The NSS highlighted the following story in Media Round-up today.
http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=15906
Schools and Universities (even the Catholic ones) are ever more submitted to the direct control of States … The contents of teaching [are] imposed by the State, not only through the so called programs but also by means of textbooks … In fact in this way a cultural vision distant from Christian faith or even explicitly contrary to it, is insinuated in the minds of the young.
The Trojan horse through which States appropriates the intelligence of students is the formation of professors. In many countries professors are trained solely in the State universities and in any case those who wish to teach must have the State qualification conferred in accordance with the training course established by the States and by State examination.
The progressive de-Christianization of the West has occurred in this way through the de-Christianization of schools and universities. Now a New Evangelization may take place only in the recognition of persons, of their conscience and their rights.
That last sentence is actually spot on – but not in the way that he intended!
More here:
http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=15925
Our youth today find themselves in an unsustainable condition. On the one hand, they are thrown long before the appropriate mental age into a world rich in information, knowledge, sensations, and opportunities for encounters, but on the other hand, they are left alone by adults on the path of their formation.
No other age has known the individual and mass freedom that is experienced by our young people. But this liberty does not correspond to any promise for the future, as the older generation has abandoned its educative role.
The current problem is the absence of care that adults show to the new generations. It is not that adults in general are not concerned about the future of their children, but rather that their concerns do not coincide with caring for them. The concerns of parents are not sufficient to offer support in the formation of their children. As in a sort of reversal of the Oedipus myth, it is the fathers who kill their offspring.
Heaven forbid that the young should ever think for themselves!