Pakistani Rights Activist, 14 year old girl, Shot by Taliban

[Sunni Man]

In an attack drawing widespread condemnation, a lone Taliban gunman today approached a crowded school bus in Pakistan's once-volatile Swat region and opened fire. His target: A 14-year-old girl who'd campaigned against the Taliban for the right to go to school.

Television footage showed Malala Yousafzai lying on a stretcher and being airlifted to a military hospital in Peshawar. The gunman approached the bus and asked whether anyone could identify Malala, according to local police.

When one of her schoolmates singled out the teen, the gunman shot her twice, including once in the head. He also shot the girl who identified Malala before fleeing.

Malala is in serious condition, while the other girl's condition is unknown.

A Taliban spokesman has claimed responsibility, referring to her campaign for the right to go to school an "obscenity.

"This was a new chapter of obscenity, and we have to finish this chapter," Taliban spokesman Ahsanullah Ahsan said in a statement sent to The Associated Press. "We have carried out this attack."

Malala's rise to prominence began in 2009, when she wrote a diary for BBC Urdu under a pseudonym chronicling the oppression she and other girls at her school faced at the hands of the Taliban. At the time, the Taliban had ordered the closure of all girls schools in the region.

Her father, who ran a private school, was forced to comply, leaving Malala and her friends with nowhere to study. In all, 50,000 girls were forced out of school in a matter of days.

In one blog post titled "Do not wear colourful dresses," Malala wrote about not wearing school uniforms, to avoid being detected by the Taliban.

Pakistani Rights Activist, 14, Shot by Taliban After Encouraging Girls to Go to School - ABC News

 

[Grandma]

In other news republican politicians want to eliminate the Department of Education and raise rates on student loans.

 

[Peter Dow]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngAIoxzIBzM]Malala Yousufzai - Free Pakistan - Kill the Taliban - YouTube[/ame]

AfPak military strategy blog

 

[waltky]

Guess the Taliban figures Allah smiles on pigs who shoot unarmed teen-aged girls...

Pakistani doctors remove bullet from girl shot by Taliban
11 Oct.`12 - Pakistani surgeons removed a bullet on Wednesday from a 14-year-old girl shot by the Taliban for speaking out against the militants and promoting education for girls, doctors said.

Malala Yousufzai was in critical condition after gunmen shot her in the head and neck on Tuesday as she left school. Two other girls were also wounded. Yousufzai began standing up to the Pakistani Taliban when she was just 11, when the government had effectively ceded control of the Swat Valley where she lives to the militants. 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.

One of the girls wounded with Yousufzai is in critical condition and the other is recovering and out of danger. The military flew Yousufzai from her home in Swat, northwest of Islamabad, to Peshawar on Tuesday. The shooting was denounced across Pakistan. The front pages of national newspapers carried pictures of a bandaged and bloody Yousufzai being brought to hospital. "Hate targets hope" the Express Tribune said in a headline.

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.

"PEACE WILL BE SHAKEN"

 

[there4eyeM]

Of course, whatever is said on these pages will have no affect, but such action shows the depth to which human reasoning and thinking can descend.
What a coward, to shoot a child that way.

 

[waltky]

14 year-old girl switches hospitals after being shot by Taliban swine...

Malala Yousafzai: Shot Pakistan girl moves hospitals
11 October 2012 - The BBC's Aleem Maqbool reports from Malala's school in Pakistan, where he says students have been left "traumatised"

A 14-year-old Pakistani girl shot in the head by Taliban gunmen has been transferred to a new military hospital with better facilities. Malala Yousafzai, in critical condition two days after being attacked in the north-western Swat Valley, arrived by helicopter in Rawalpindi from Peshawar. The Taliban, who accuse the young activist of "promoting secularism", have said they will target her again. There have been widespread protests in Pakistan against the shooting.

Malala Yousafzai was being treated in an intensive care unit in Peshawar before doctors decided to move her to the Armed Forces Institute of Cardiology critical care unit in Rawalpindi. One of the medical team treating her said "neurologically she has significantly improved" but that the "coming days... are very critical". Another doctor, Mumtaz Khan, told AFP news agency that she had a 70% chance of survival. "Her condition is not yet out of danger despite improvement," Masood Kausar, the governor of the north-western Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, was also quoted as saying.

'Barbaric mindset'

Pakistani officials have offered a 10m rupee ($105,000; £66,000) reward for information leading to the arrest of the attackers. Army chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, who visited Malala in hospital in Peshawar on Wednesday, said it was time to "stand up to fight the propagators of such barbaric mindset and their sympathisers". Malala gained attention aged 11, when she started writing a diary for BBC Urdu about life under the Taliban. Using the pen-name Gul Makai, she wrote about suffering caused by militants who had taken control of the Swat Valley in 2007 and ordered girls' schools to close. The Taliban were ousted from Swat in 2009, but her family said they had regularly received death threats. They believed she would be safe among her own community, but on Tuesday, she was stopped as she returned home from school in Mingora, in north-western Swat, and shot in the head. Two other girls were injured.

Schools in the Swat Valley closed on Wednesday in protest at the attack, and schoolchildren in other parts of the country prayed for the girl's recovery. Protests were held in Islamabad, Peshawar, Multan and in Malala's hometown of Mingora and in Lahore. Those taking part praised the girl's bravery, while many condemned the attack as un-Islamic. The attack has also drawn international condemnation. Former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown, now the UN special envoy for global education, said Malala Yousafzai had become an "icon for courage and hope" for more than 30 million girls worldwide who are denied primary schooling. Mr Brown said he had accepted an invitation from President Asif Ali Zardari to lead a delegation to Pakistan in November "to talk about how he can improve opportunities for children".

BBC News - Malala Yousafzai: Shot Pakistan girl moves hospitals

 

[waltky]

Granny says, "Good - now dey can line `em up an' shoot `em inna firin' squad...

Pakistani police make arrests in shooting of girl
Oct 12,`12 -- Pakistani police have arrested a number of suspects in the case of a 14-year-old girl shot and wounded by the Taliban for promoting education for girls and criticizing the fundamentalist Islamic movement, officials said Friday.

The shooting of Malala Yousufzai along with two classmates while they were on their way home from school Tuesday horrified people in Pakistan and internationally. It has been followed by an outpouring of support for a girl who earned the enmity of the Taliban for publicizing their acts and speaking about the importance of education for girls. The Taliban have claimed responsibility for the shooting, saying that the girl was promoting "Western thinking." Late on Thursday, a spokesman for one of the group's branches in the country's north decided two months ago to kill Yousufzai in a carefully planned attack after her family ignored repeated warnings. Police have been questioning people in the town of Mingora, in the Swat Valley, where the shooting took place.

Mingora police chief Afzal Khan Afridi said arrests had been made, but he declined to give any details about the number of people detained or what role they're suspected of having in the shooting. He said he did not want to endanger the ongoing investigation. Interior Minister Rehman Malik told reporters Friday that the two gunmen who staged the attack were not among those arrested, but he said investigators had identified the masterminds of the shooting and efforts were under way to capture all those involved. The Taliban spokesman, Sirajuddin Ahmad, said Yousufzai's family had been warned three times - the most recent warning coming last week - before the decision was made to kill her.

Ahmad said local Taliban leader Maulana Fazlullah and his deputies selected three attackers, including two trained sharpshooters, who carefully studied the girl's route home from school. Even before the Taliban took over the Swat Valley, Fazlullah's radio broadcasts spread fear among residents in the area. The group first started to exert its influence in 2007 and quickly extended its reach to much of the valley by the next year. They set about imposing their will on residents by forcing men to grow beards, preventing women from going to the market and blowing up many schools - the majority for girls.

Malala wrote about these practices in a journal for the BBC under a pseudonym when she was just 11. After the Taliban were pushed out of the valley in 2009 by the Pakistani military, she became even more outspoken in advocating for girls' education. She appeared frequently in the media and was given one of the country's highest honors for civilians for her bravery.

MORE

See also:

Malala Yousafzai: Pakistan observes day of prayer
12 October 2012 - The BBC's Aleem Maqbool visits the scene of Malala's shooting in the town of Mingora

People in Pakistan have been observing a day of prayer for the recovery of a 14-year-old girl shot in the head by Taliban gunmen. Malala Yousafzai was transferred to a military hospital in Rawalpindi on Thursday. Doctors say her progress over the next few days will be "critical". The girl wrote a diary about suffering under the Taliban and was accused by them of "promoting secularism". Police said they had arrested four people in connection with the attack. They were among about 100 people rounded up this week, most of whom were later released on bail. The suspected mastermind of the attack remains at large.

Meanwhile, Pakistani officials said they had intercepted a telephone conversation suggesting Taliban militants were planning attacks against the media over their coverage of the shooting. The Taliban had earlier said they would target Malala Yousafzai again. Local officials have offered a 10m rupee ($105,000; £66,000) reward for information leading to the arrest of the attackers. The shooting has prompted outrage and protests across Pakistan. On Friday, school children dedicated prayers to her recovery in morning assemblies and she was also remembered during weekly prayers at mosques across the country.

Many prayer leaders condemned the attack, including the chief cleric of Pakistan's largest mosque, Shahi Masjid, in Lahore. He called the young activist an "ambassador of peace and knowledge'". Schools in the Swat Valley closed on Wednesday - the day after the shooting - in protest at the attack. Rallies have also been held in Islamabad, Peshawar, Lahore, Multan as well as in Malala's hometown of Mingora. The attack has also drawn widespread international condemnation.

'Critical' hours

 

[Decus]

Does she or others like her deserve this? Joe Biden was explaining less than a year ago that the Taliban wasn't per se our enemy. What are they then? Fucked up situation and damn sad for the girl.

 

[Katzndogz]

Both obama and biden said that the taliban wasn't our enemy.

The Taliban are not an enemy of the U.S. and should not be talked about in such terms, Joe Biden has claimed.
The vice-president said the militant Islamist group only represents an inherent threat if it allows Al-Qaeda to strike at the U.S.
In an interview with Newsweek, Mr Biden warned against labelling the Taliban as an enemy.


Read more: Taliban are not our enemy, says Joe Biden as US to negotiate deal to end Afghanistan war | Mail Online
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

Then obama and biden said that Al Quaeda wasn't a threat.

Ahead of the anniversary of Osama bin Laden’s death, a top American counter-terrorism official said that the core of bin Laden’s terror organization, al Qaeda, is in shambles and is a “shadow of its former self,” but the fight continues.

Al Qaeda ‘Shadow of Former Self’, US Counter-Terror Official Says - ABC News

These are the natural democrat allies, not enemies, so it is natural that there is no concern of this little girl's life. If her mother got pregnant in the US, the child (being female) would have been aborted.

 

[koshergrl]

In other news republican politicians want to eliminate the Department of Education and raise rates on student loans.

Good. Maybe our kids will start learning again.

 

[Samson]

In other news republican politicians want to eliminate the Department of Education and raise rates on student loans.

See, the idea is to follow the fuckin' thread, or start one with a totally different topic.

Even a partisan idiot should be able to grasp this concept.

 

[Samson]

In an attack drawing widespread condemnation, a lone Taliban gunman today approached a crowded school bus in Pakistan's once-volatile Swat region and opened fire. ..... At the time, the Taliban had ordered the closure of all girls schools in the region.

Who the fuck is running the Swat region of Pakistan? Pakistanis or the Taliban....or are they one and the same?

Apparently the "once-volatile" region still is a tad hot. The USA should encourage Pakistan to get their nuclear-armed shit together, pronto, before we do it for them.

 

[Peter Dow]

Who the fuck is running the Swat region of Pakistan? Pakistanis or the Taliban....or are they one and the same?

The sincere Pakistani politicians who are not one and the same as the Taliban are not winning, they are getting assassinated.

The insincere Pakistani politicians may well say they not one and the same as the Taliban so as to get US and Western cash in billions of dollars a year but then take the cash and spend it on something else, such as nuclear weapons and other expensive items desired by the Pakistani elite.

The Pakistani military intelligence agency appears to be organising, training and arming the Taliban and other terrorist groups. Watch this video -

VIDEO: BBC Documentary - "SECRET PAKISTAN - Double Cross / Backlash" (2 hours)
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_SkNUorWhc"]Secret BBC - Pakistan Double Cross on Terrorism - Full - YouTube[/ame]

So if the Pakistani military support the Taliban what chance do unarmed civilians have against armed terrorists? None.

What sense does it make for the USA to give military aid to the Pakistani military which is supporting the Taliban? None.

Yet American tax-payer money flows to the Pakistani military in billions of dollars every year.

Kansas City Star: ""Pakistan freed of anti-terrorism obligations; U.S. billions flow instead"

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration has refused for the first time to declare that Pakistan is making progress toward ending alleged military support for Islamic militant groups or preventing al Qaida, the Afghan Taliban or other extremists from staging attacks in Afghanistan.

Even so, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has quietly informed Congress that she’s waived the legal restrictions that would have blocked some $2 billion in U.S. economic and military aid to Pakistan. Disbursing the funds, she said in an official notice, is “important to the national security interests of the United States.”

Apparently the "once-volatile" region still is a tad hot. The USA should encourage Pakistan to get their nuclear-armed shit together, pronto, before we do it for them.

Well USA aid money has enabled the Pakistanis to get more nuclear weapons. The way to stop a country getting more nuclear weapons is like with Iran, apply sanctions, bankrupt their economy. Giving a country billions in aid simply encourages them to get more and more nuclear weapons.

So long as the US government continues to give no-strings billions of dollars to the Pakistani state with a naive wish that aid money will be well-spent against terrorism, the reverse will be guaranteed.

We need a proper military strategy to fight the Taliban and their supporters in the Pakistani state.

Only very intelligent military strategists, as smart as I am, can carry such a strategy out.

Popular but foolish politicians will never beat the Taliban, not "pronto", not ever, and innocents will continue to slaughtered, all for show, because the US government has more money than brains.

Read
"Afghanistan – Pakistan (AfPak) military strategy and the war on terror"

 

[waltky]

Malala slowly improving...

Shot Pakistani girl responding well to treatment
Oct 16,`12 -- A teenage Pakistani girl shot in the head by the Taliban for promoting girls' education has responded well to treatment and impressed doctors with her strength, the British hospital where she was being treated said Tuesday.

Experts are optimistic that 14-year-old Malala Yousufzai, who was airlifted Monday to Britain to receive specialized medical care, has a good chance of recovery because unlike adults, the brains of teenagers are still growing and can adapt to trauma better. "Her response to treatment so far indicated that she could make a good recovery from her injuries," the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in central England's Birmingham said in a statement. Despite the early optimism, the full extent of Malala's brain injuries has not been made public and outside experts cautioned it is extremely unlikely that a full recovery of all her brain's functions can be made. Instead, they could only hope that the bullet took a "lucky path" - going through a more "silent," or less active - part of the brain. "You don't have a bullet go through your brain and have a full recovery," said Dr. Jonathan Fellus, chief scientific officer at the New Jersey-based International Brain Research Foundation.

Malala was returning home from school in Pakistan last week when she was targeted by the Taliban for promoting girls' education and criticizing the militant group's behavior when they took over the scenic Swat Valley where she lived. Two of her classmates were also wounded in the attack and are receiving treatment in Pakistan. She arrived Monday in Britain, where she can be protected from follow-up attacks threatened by the militants. The Taliban have threatened to target Malala again because she promotes "Western thinking." There was some concern for the teenager's safety Tuesday when police stopped and questioned two people who tried to visit Malala, but hospital officials and police stressed there was no threat to the girl's safety. The two people, who claimed to be Malala's relatives, were turned away. "We think it's probably people being over-curious," hospital spokesman Dr. Dave Rosser said.

Pakistani doctors at a military hospital earlier removed a bullet from Malala's body that entered her head and headed toward her spine. The military has said she was able to move her legs and hands several days ago when her sedatives were reduced. They have not said whether she suffered any brain damage or other permanent damage. On Monday, the military said damaged bones in Malala's skull will need to be repaired or replaced, and she will need "intensive neuro rehabilitation." The decision to send the girl abroad was taken in consultation with her family, and the Pakistani government will pay for her treatment. Doctors say Malala has an advantage because teens are generally healthier and their bodies have a stronger ability to react to the disruption that the injury causes.

MORE

See also:

Suspicious Malala visitors likely "over-curious"
October 16, 2012, An official at the British hospital treating a Pakistani teen activist says the people who showed up asking about the girl were probably just "over-curious," not a threat to her safety.

Dr. Dave Rosser, medical director of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, says several people turned up at the hospital overnight claiming to be relatives of the girl, but they didn't get very far. He says security is "under control." Two people were questioned by police.

The 14-year-old, Malala Yousufzai, was shot in the head on her way home from school last week in Pakistan. The Taliban claimed responsibility and said they would try again to kill her for promoting the education of girls and other "Western thinking."

Pakistan's president calls the teen "a symbol of all that is good in us." He says "the work she did is far higher before God than that which is being done by terrorists in the name of religion."

Pakistan's interior minister has announced a $1 million bounty for the Pakistani Taliban spokesman who announced that the Taliban had carried out the attack.

Suspicious Malala visitors likely "over-curious" - CBS News

 

[waltky]

Malala 'standing' again!...

Doctors: Malala 'standing' for first time since attack
Fri 19 Oct 2012 - Pakistani teen shot by Taliban shows more progress

Malala Yousafzai has stood for the first time since her attack, according to doctors treating her at Birmingham's Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

A spokesman said the 15-year-old has agreed that her clinical details can be made public.

He said that the hospital was trying to arrange for Malala to listen to father on the phone, but the girl is currently unable to talk.

"We know there was some damage to the brain, certainly no physical, no deficit in terms of function," the spokesman added.

Doctors: Malala 'standing' for first time since attack - ITV News

See also:

After attack on Malala, Taliban threaten journalists who cover it
Fri October 19, 2012 - "We are scared, but what can we do?" a Pakistani reporter says; The Taliban have threatened journalists following the shooting of Malala; They say the journalists are "passing judgment" on them; Pakistan is one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a reporter

The Pakistani Taliban sought to silence the teenage education activist Malala Yousufzai by shooting her in the head. They're also trying to stifle the widespread criticism of the attack in the news media by threatening journalists in Pakistan. The militant group's menacing statements have intensified fears among reporters in a country that is already one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a journalist. The attack on Malala, 14, in the northwestern district of Swat last week has left her battling to recover from her injuries in a hospital in Britain and generated a wave of shock and anger in Pakistan and around the world.

The Taliban quickly claimed responsibility for the act, but they didn't appear to have anticipated the level of revulsion and condemnation that it would provoke. Thousands of people joined in rallies across Pakistan in support of the wounded teen, and calls grew for a strong response from the government. As coverage of the shooting -- and the appalled reaction to it -- swept across the Pakistani and international news media, the Taliban began issuing lengthy statements trying to justify the targeting of Malala, who had defied them by insisting on the right of girls to go to school.

They also complained that "this filthy, godless media has taken huge advantage of this situation, and journalists have started passing judgment on us," raising the prospect of killing those journalists. Reporters in northwestern Pakistan, the region where the Taliban are active, say they have been alerted by authorities of an increased risk to their security and some of them have received warnings that they are being specifically targeted. "Things after Malala have become more tense, as the Taliban is very angry with the way the attack was reported," said a veteran journalist in Peshawar, the main city in the restive northwestern region near the border with Afghanistan. "We are scared, but what can we do? We have to work."

The journalist, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of fear of reprisals, noted that factions of the Taliban had killed and abducted other journalists in the past because they were unhappy with their coverage. Tanvir Ahmed Tahir, the executive director of the All Pakistan Newspapers Society, a trade body of publishers, said the organization had requested extra security from the government to protect its members' operations and staff in light of the Taliban statements. The militants' threats against journalists for covering an attack for which they had unabashedly claimed responsibility may seem contradictory. But it goes to the heart of the Taliban's approach, according to Mustafa Qadri, Pakistan researcher for the human rights group Amnesty International.

More http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/19/world...-media-threat/index.html?eref=rss_mostpopular

Well, duh! If ya don't want to be judged - don't go around shootin' teenaged girls who are just trying to get an education.

 

[waltky]

Malala shooting starting backlash against Taliban...

Shot Pakistani girl "not out of the woods" but doing well
October 19, 2012 - A Pakistani girl shot in the head by Taliban gunmen is "not out of the woods" but is doing well and has been able to stand for the first time, doctors at the British hospital treating her said on Friday.

Malala Yousufzai, who was shot for vocally opposing the Taliban, was flown from Pakistan to Birmingham to receive treatment after the attack earlier this month, which drew widespread international condemnation. She has become a symbol of resistance to the Islamist group's effort to deny women education and other rights. Dave Rosser, medical director of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, said she was now able to write and appeared to have memory recall despite her brain injuries. "It's clear that she's not out of the woods yet," Rosser told reporters, saying she had sustained a "very, very grave injury". But he said she was "doing very well". "In fact she was standing with some help for the first time this morning. She's communicating very freely, writing," he said.

Rosser said, however, that the teenager was not able to speak because she had undergone a tracheotomy so she could breathe through a tube in her neck, an operation that was performed because her airways had been swollen by the bullet. Yousufzai was shot as she left school in Swat, northwest of Islamabad. The Taliban said they attacked her because she spoke out against the group and praised U.S. President Barack Obama. The alleged organizer of the shooting was captured during a 2009 military offensive against the Taliban, but released after three months, two senior officials told Reuters. In a detailed statement about Yousufzai's injuries, Rosser said she had suffered fractures to the base of her skull and to the bone behind her left ear. Her left jawbone is also injured at its joint.

"POINT BLANK RANGE"

"Malala was shot at point blank range," with the bullet hitting her left brow, Rosser said. But instead of penetrating skull it travelled underneath the skin, the whole length of the side of her head and into her neck. Shock waves from the shot shattered the thinnest bone of her skull and fragments were driven into her brain. Rosser said there was certainly physical damage to the brain but it was too early to tell whether that would affect any brain functions. "She seems to be able to understand, she has some memory," he said. "She's able to stand, she's got motor control ... (but) whether there are any subtle intellectual or memory deficits down the line, it's too early to say."

The hospital unit is expert in dealing with complex trauma cases and has treated hundreds of soldiers wounded in Afghanistan. It has the world's largest single-floor critical care unit for patients with gunshot wounds, burns, spinal damage and major head injuries. Rosser said Yousufzai's treatment is likely to include reconstructive surgery to replace the damaged skull bone. That surgery is unlikely to be able to be carried until for several weeks or even months, he said, since she is also fighting an infection that needs to be cured first. "She's going to need a couple of weeks to rehabilitate, to make sure the infection is cleared up," he said.

Pakistani girl shot by Taliban "doing well" - Yahoo! News

See also:

U.S. sees potential for wider anti-Taliban uprising
Thu, Oct 18, 2012 - Villagers fed up with insurgents closing schools take up arms on their own

Fed up with the Taliban closing their schools and committing other acts of oppression, men in a village about 100 miles south of Kabul took up arms late last spring and chased out the insurgents with no help from the Afghan government or U.S. military. Small-scale revolts in recent months like the one in Kunsaf, mostly along a stretch of desert south of the Afghan capital, indicate bits of a grass-roots, do-it-yourself anti-insurgency that the U.S. hopes Afghan authorities can transform into a wider movement. Perhaps it can undercut the Taliban in areas they still dominate after 11 years of war with the United States and NATO allies. The effort in Ghazni Province looks like a long shot. The villagers don't readily embrace any outside authority, be it the Taliban, the U.S. or the Afghan government.

American officials nonetheless are quietly nurturing the trend, hoping it might become a game changer, or at least a new roadblock for the Taliban. At the same time, they are adamant that if anyone can convince the villagers to side with the Afghan government, it's the Afghans — not the Americans. "If we went out there and talked to them we would taint these groups and it would backfire," said Army Brig. Gen. John Charlton, the senior American adviser to the Afghan military in provinces along the southern approaches to Kabul. Charlton, who witnessed similar stirrings in Iraq while serving as a commander there in 2007, said that in some cases the Taliban are fighting back fiercely, killing leaders of the armed uprisings. In Kunsaf, for example, the Taliban killed several village fighters in skirmishes as recently as last month, but the Taliban suffered heavy losses and have thus far failed to retake the village.

The American general visited two military bases in the area last week — one in Ghazni's Ab Band district that was vacated by a U.S. Army brigade as part of September's U.S. troop drawdown, and the other in nearby Gelan district, where Afghan paramilitary police forces are moving in to fill the gap left by the Americans. Charlton found far fewer paramilitary police there than he says are needed; he is nudging the Afghans to get hundreds more into the area to put more pressure on the Taliban in support of the village uprisings. Charlton said the U.S. and its coalition partners are taking a behind-the-scenes role — encouraging the Afghans to court the villagers while finding a role for U.S. Special Forces soldiers to forge the villagers into a fighting force as members of the Kabul-sanctioned Afghan Local Police. Some have compared the apparently spontaneous uprisings to the Iraq war's Anbar Awakening of 2007, in which Sunni Arab tribes in the western province of Anbar turned on al-Qaida in their midst, joined forces with the Americans and dealt a blow that many credit with turning the tide of that conflict. The U.S. armed and paid the tribal fighters and sought to integrate them into Iraqi government forces.

By coincidence, the first localized movement to draw outside attention in Afghanistan was in Ghazni's Andar district, about 100 miles south of Kabul. Thus some U.S. analysts are calling this the Andar Awakening, drawing an Iraq war parallel that even the most optimistic American commanders say is a stretch. "That just builds some false expectations," said Army Lt. Col. Kevin Lambert, a 1st Infantry Division battalion commander whose area of operations includes Ghazni. He nonetheless is encouraged that after initially balking, the Afghan government is now trying to leverage the Andar unrest. It has installed a new district governor who Lambert said is sympathetic to the uprisings and made changes in the local security forces. It also has authorized a U.S. Special Forces team to work with the villagers. "It's going to take time, it's not going to be an Anbar (Iraq) sweep," Lambert said. "It is going to be village by village, district by district, and we may not see the results of this for some years."

More US sees potential for wider anti-Taliban uprising - Yahoo! News

 

[Connery]

As long as there are courageous people like this girl there is hope that someday people will experience those freedoms that many of us enjoy as a way of life. Life among the Taliban is a living hell.

Surviving and becoming a symbol of her cause for freedom and education is a good way to answers these creeps. I do not believe these people will change but for this 14 year old to stand against the Taliban and their means of disposing of problems may inspire others.

 

[waltky]

Young hero to get a hero's reception...

"Hero's reception" awaits Pakistani teen back home
October 20, 2012 - Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani 15-year-old shot by the Taliban for advocating education for females, has come out of her coma and was able to stand Friday, in her hospital room in England.

She was described as looking bright and alert. Word of that set off celebrations in Pakistan. The daughter of the late Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto tweeted, "Miracles of today! Malala able to stand." Malala's story "really has galvanized both that country and the world," says Gayle Lemmon, deputy director of the Women and Policy program of the Council on Foreign Relations and author of the best-seller on life under the Taliban, "The Dressmaker of Khair Khana." "She's a symbol of so many other young girls you never meet who brave danger, acid attacks, the threat of poisoning every day just for the simple act of going into a classroom and sitting and learning," Lemmon continued. "You may able to shoot a 15-year-old girl but you can't kill an idea, and I think she has become only more powerful, a symbol of the fight to go to school every day."

Lemmon told "CBS This Morning: Saturday" co-hosts she doesn't expect Malala to cower in the face of Taliban threats to kill her. "Look," Lemmon said, "if they threatened her and she didn't give up before they shot her, you can imagine that, after they shot her, she's not going to be quiet. She said in 2009 that 'they cannot stop me.' And I cannot imagine now, that the word has actually been forced to pay attention to the fight of these brave young girls, who have really been armed only with backpacks in their struggle to go to school, that shoe' going to back down now."

When Malala returns home, after a long recovery and rehabilitation in England, "I think she will be greeted with a hero's reception because, really, there are so many young women who have the same story," Lemmon said. "You know, they fight all the time -- with the support of their fathers, just as Mala did. And yet, almost no one pays attention to their struggle until something this extreme and this awful really forces the world to pay attention to these homegrown role models. "I have spent years interviewing women who braved real personal danger to set up living room classrooms and girls who braved their familys' security just to sit there. And a lot of times I'm asked, 'Is this a Western import or a foreign import?' The truth is, even when the world forgets these girls, they fight themselves for the right to go to stool. And I think what Mala's story has done is made it impossible to look away and impossible to forget about these girls' struggle."

But there has been progress, Lemmon says, at least in one nation in that part of the world. "You know, in Afghanistan particularly, you really see a lot. In 2001, less than one percent of the country's girls were in school, and now close to 3 million are. And every day, they go out and battle all kinds of threats just to sit and learn. Their battle is really everyone's fight because, if you look at the world, 40 million of the 70 million children who aren't in school are in countries that are struggling against war, and there is no better correlation to predicting violence than education levels."

"Hero's reception" awaits Pakistani teen back home - CBS News

 

[waltky]

Of course they wonder why - `cause they're a buncha ignorant, irreligious pigs...

Al Qaeda wonders why world cares about Malala, teen shot by Taliban
October 22, 2012 - Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Pakistan seem to have been caught off guard by the outpouring of support for Malala.

Al Qaeda doesn’t get why the civilized world is rallying behind Malala, the 15-year-old girl shot in the head by Taliban thugs for fighting to help get Pakistani girls an education. Al Qaeda’s Pakistani spokesman, Ustad Ahmad Farooq, has issued a statement on the assassination attempt, wondering why people in Pakistan and around the world have made the girl a heroine.

An excerpt from the letter, titled "Why Mourn Malala so Much?" and addressed to"[my] beloved Pakistani brothers and sisters," was translated by the SITE Intelligence Group. The letter claims that the West has done far worse to Muslim women. Specifically, Farooq asks why the media and the public are silent about women who die due to poverty and women killed during military operations in Swat and Waziristan.

“Nobody spoke up for thousands of such Malalas who became victims of military operations, and nobody protested for them on the roads,” Farooq wrote. “But these circles made so much noise when we targeted this girl who made fun of jihad, the veil and other Islamic values on behest of the British Broadcasting Corporation. This attack created shockwaves in the ruling circles around the world. They issued a number of statements condemning the attack on Malala. I may ask why? Why is Malala's blood more important than those killed by the army?"

Malala Yousufzai is recuperating in a United Kingdom hospital, where she was taken one week ago after doctors in her homeland removed the bullet from her shoulder. She stood for the first time since her shooting and is "communicating very freely," according to a hospital official. The brave girl still cannot talk because she has a tracheotomy tube inserted to protect her airway, which was swollen after the shooting, but she is writing messages, according to Dave Rosser, director of University Hospitals Birmingham.

Read more: Al Qaeda wonders why world cares about Malala, teen shot by Taliban | Fox News

 

[waltky]

Granny says, "Bet dey don't name no colleges after any Taliban...

In rebuke to Taliban, Pakistan college named for Malala
Fri October 26, 2012 - Malala Yousafzai was shot in the head for speaking out; "She sacrificed her life for us, for education," says an admirer; "Without an education, girls and boys are nothing," says another; Taliban claimed responsibility for shooting Malala, who remains hospitalized

In a message of defiance to the Taliban, authorities in Swat have decided to rename a government college after Malala Yousafzai, the 15-year-old girl who was shot in the head after demanding education for girls. The college offers high school and undergraduate education for 2,000 girls and young women. The female students here were reluctant to appear on camera -- afraid they, too, may be targeted. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the October 9 shooting, which left Malala wounded.

The students told CNN they were also afraid to attend the school, but were doing so anyway -- inspired by Malala and their right to seek an education. "I myself think that education is important because women have no right in this society so, due to education, they can get their right in this Pakhtun society especially," said Gulalai, an 18-year-old undergraduate student studying statistics and economics. "I think she's a very brave girl," said Mehreen, 17, who is studying chemistry, botany and zoology. "She sacrificed her life for us, for education, that girls should take education for their bright future. For women it's very important in this society."

They are attending the Swat Valley's first degree college to be named after a woman. "We always want to send a message across the world, that here we want to develop the female gender and we also want females to come forward in society," said Kamran Rehman Khan, a local government official. Asked if he was trying to send a message to the Taliban, too, he said, "Yes for sure ... We just want to tell them we will not be deterred by their actions."

More In rebuke to Taliban, Pakistan college named for Malala - CNN.com