'It was such a joy for me to return there today -- after 13 long years -- to be surrounded by the mountains, dip my hands in the cold river and laugh with my beloved cousins.
'This place is very dear to my heart and I hope to return again and again.
'I pray for peace in every corner of our beautiful country.
'The recent attacks, including in Bannu yesterday, are heartbreaking.
'I am sending my condolences to the victims and their families and offer my prayers for the safety of every person in my homeland,' Malala posted on X. Photograph: Kind courtesy @Malala/X
Pakistan's first Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Malala Yousafzai on Wednesday, March 5, w025, visited her hometown in the troubled northwest of the country for the first time after being shot by the Taliban and met family members.
She flew by helicopter to Barkana in Shangla district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, where she met with her uncle, Ramazan, who recently underwent surgery in Islamabad after suffering from heart problems, and also visited the ancestral graveyard, The Dawn newspaper reported.
Karora Station House Officer Amjad Alam Khan told Dawn that Malala was accompanied by her father Ziauddin Yousafzai and her husband, Aseer Malik, who she married in 2021.
SHO Khan said Malala also visited the school and college she had established in Barkana in 2018 to provide free education to approximately one thousand girls in the district, which previously had no functional government college for girls.
Malala also visited the home of her maternal family before returning to Islamabad.
Malala's first visit to Pakistan after being shot was in 2018.
Following that, she visited Pakistan in 2022 to travel to areas devastated by unprecedented monsoon flooding.
She also visited in January this year to attend the International Conference on Girls' Education in Muslim Communities in Islamabad.
Feature Presentation: Ashish Narsale/Rediff.com
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