Malala visit to hometown may not be possible
Mingora ( Pakistan), March 30: A Pakistani women’s activist said Friday that Malala Yousafzai, who has returned to Pakistan’s capital Islamabad for the first time since a Taliban militant shot her in 2012, was hoping to visit her Swat Valley hometown but that the trip depended on security clearances from the government.
Security was visibly beefed up in Mingora, the Nobel Peace Prize winner’s hometown, but authorities wouldn’t confirm whether she would be arriving there. Yousafzai is expected to return to London on Monday.
Activist Adnan Tabassum, also from Swat, met with Yousafzai on Thursday in Islamabad. She said Yousafzai told her that she wanted to travel to Swat to see her former school friends and relatives.
According to Tabassum, 20- year- old Yousafzai asked authorities to allow her to go to Shangla village in Swat, where a school has been built by her Malala Fund.
“Malala is not afraid of going to Swat, where the terrorists opened fire on her in 2012 and wounded her. It is her wish to again see her hometown, her school and her home, where she spent years of her life,” she said.