Pakistani doctors remove bullet from girl shot by Taliban

PESHAWAR, Pakistan Wed Oct 10, 2012 3:14pm EDT

1 of 4. Activists from non-governmental organisations in support of human rights hold pictures of Malala Yousufzai during a demonstration in Islamabad October 10, 2012.

Credit: Reuters/Faisal Mahmood

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Her courage made her a national hero and many Pakistanis were shocked by her shooting.

General Ashfaq Kayani, chief of Pakistan's powerful army, visited her in hospital and condemned her attackers.

"The cowards who attacked Malala and her fellow students, have shown time and again how little regard they have for human life and how low they can fall in their cruel ambition to impose their twisted ideology," Kayani said in a statement.

The military said it had a simple message, which it wrote in capital letters in the statement to add emphasis: "WE REFUSE TO BOW BEFORE TERROR."

Doctors said they were forced to begin operating in the middle of the night after Yousufzai developed swelling in the left portion of her brain.

They removed a bullet from her body near her spinal cord during a three-hour operation that they finished at about 5 a.m. (0000 GMT).

"She is still unconscious and kept in the intensive care unit," said Mumtaz Khan, head of a team of doctors taking care of Yousufzai in a military hospital in the northwestern city of Peshawar.


The military flew Yousufzai from her home in Swat, northwest of Islamabad, to Peshawar on Tuesday.



Schools closed across Swat in protest over the shooting and a small demonstration was held in her hometown of Mingora. Another was planned in the eastern city of Lahore for later on Wednesday.

"All Pakistanis should come together and raise their voices against such acts. If they do not do this, then they should mentally prepare themselves for their own children's fate to be like Malala's," said Saeeda Diep, an organizer of the Lahore protest.

Many commentators said Yousufzai's courage contrasted with that of many of the country's leaders, who fear that challenging militants will make them targets.







The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack saying Yousufzai was "pro-West", had been promoting Western culture and had been speaking out against them.

They justified shooting her by citing instances from the Koran when a child or woman was killed.

"Any female that, by any means, plays a role in the war against mujahideen should be killed," said Taliban spokesman Ihsanullah Ihsan, using the term for Islamic holy warriors to refer to the Taliban.

"We are dead against co-education and a secular education system."

President Asif Ali Zardari said he had directed that Yousufzai be sent abroad for medical care.

A special aircraft had been sent to Peshawar in case doctors say she should be moved to the United Arab Emirates, said Zaibullah Khan, general manager of the city's airport.

Imran Khan, a former cricketer turned politician who recently led a march into northwestern Pakistan protesting against U.S. drone strikes, said he was willing to pay for Yousufzai's medical treatment in Pakistan or abroad.

"Brave girl. Praying for her recovery," he said on Twitter.

(Additional reporting by Katharine Houreld and Saud Mehsud in Dera Ismail Khan; Editing by Robert Birsel)

Comments (28)
pax_vobiscum wrote:
Sounds to me like there is no act, however depraved and despicable that cannot be ‘justified’ vis-à-vis some obscure excerpt from the Koran.

I would have the fundamentalists (of ANY faith) to put down their books and look instead into their hearts.

I practice a rather obscure ‘religion’ where knowingly causing harm to another living creature, large or small, is considered ‘wrong’, and avoided at all costs.

Oct 10, 2012 4:48am EDT  --  Report as abuse
Reuters1945 wrote:
“Her courage made her a national hero and many Pakistanis were shocked by her shooting.”

Let us hope that much recognition comes to this extraordinarily brave young girl who has, since the age of 11, battled the regressive forces in her nation that would keep women living in Stone Age conditions.

It is difficult to imagine how anyone could be so barbaric as to shoot a young child in the head. The perpetrators involved should be hunted down as the animals they are and publically executed forthwith.

There is no room for compromise with the primitive barbarians, in every part of the world who treat women as their personal property, refuse their right to an education, abuse them at will and exploit them as slaves.

There are literally hundreds of millions of men, especially in the Middle East and adjacent countries, who cannot imagine or accept the concept that women are their equals – much less their betters.

Even in Saudi Arabia, which most people are apt to think of as a modern day, wealthy, educated society, does not even allow women to drive a car and have made it a crime for a woman to do so.

And how pitiful that so many politicians, in so many parts of the world are too cowardly to speak out and take an adversarial position against these Stone Age barbarians either from abject fear of the oil cartels or just the fear of not acting “politically correct”.

I hope this 14 year old Pakastani heroine wins the Nobel Prize for Peace as well as many other forms of recognition including the Victoria Cross from the Queen of England.

In a just world, this would all be a no-brainer.

God Bless this child whose courage inspires whilst she puts most adults to shame.

Oct 10, 2012 5:19am EDT  --  Report as abuse
randburg100 wrote:
So, if there was a passage in this koran that said, “Thou shall bugger your goat twice a week to get into heaven” – then presumably the cowards from taliban would do so???

Are they SO brainwashed that they cannot think for themselves?

Oct 10, 2012 5:40am EDT  --  Report as abuse