Pakistan Medics Remove Bullet from Shot Child Activist

Pakistani doctors on Wednesday removed a bullet from a 14-year-old child campaigner shot by the Taliban in a horrific attack condemned by national leaders and rights activists.

Malala Yousafzai, 14, is in intensive care after being shot in the head in broad daylight on a school bus on Tuesday, in an assassination attempt that has appalled a country where thousands have died at the hands of Islamist extremists.

The attack took place in Mingora, the main town of the Swat valley in Pakistan's northwest, where Malala had campaigned for the right to an education during a two-year Taliban insurgency which the army said it had crushed in 2009.

She underwent surgery to remove the bullet lodged near her shoulder at the Combined Military Hospital in the northwestern city of Peshawar, where doctors described her condition as critical.

Preparations were made to fly her abroad, but a military source told Agence France Presse she was currently too ill to travel.

"She is in critical condition and doctors believe she cannot travel abroad immediately," he said, on condition of anonymity.

Doctors earlier confirmed the bullet had been removed from her shoulder and Interior Minister Rehman Malik said she would remain in Peshawar until medics agreed she could be moved.

"Malala is our pride. She became an icon for the country. I pray that she lives a healthy and long life," Malik said.

There has been shock and revulsion in Pakistan, where schoolchildren across the country on Wednesday offered prayers for her recovery.

Private schools in Swat closed on Wednesday as a mark of solidarity with Malala and children will hold special ceremonies on Thursday to pray for her.

The powerful army chief General Ashfaq Kayani visited Malala on Wednesday and said it was time to "further unite and stand up to fight the propagators of such barbaric mindset and their sympathizers".

"She has become a symbol for the values that the army, with the nation behind it, is fighting to preserve for our future generations," he said.

"We wish to bring home a simple message: We refuse to bow before terror. We will fight, regardless of the cost, we will prevail inshallah (God willing)."

Around 250 people took part in three small rallies in Mingora to condemn the attack.

Malala won international recognition for highlighting Taliban atrocities in Swat with a blog for the BBC three years ago, when the Islamist militants burned girls' schools and terrorized the valley.

Her struggle resonated with tens of thousands of girls denied an education by Islamist militants across northwest Pakistan, where the government has been fighting local Taliban since 2007.

She received the first national peace award from the Pakistani government last year, and was also nominated for the International Children's Peace Prize.

Commentators said the brazen shooting raises serious questions about why the government did not do more to protect Malala and about the Taliban presence in Swat, three years after the army said it had defeated the uprising.

Pakistan's lower house of parliament on Wednesday suspended normal proceedings to condemn the attack and pray for her recovery.

"Malala Yousafzai is a role model for all Pakistan and we should stand united to fight the elements that attacked the 14-year-old girl," said Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar.

Amid public outrage, the Pakistani Taliban issued another statement seeking to justify the cold-blooded murder attempt on a child, saying that any female who opposed them should be killed.

Followers of the Taliban, who controlled much of Swat from 2007-2009, have destroyed hundreds of girls' schools across northwest Pakistan.

Malala's shooting is likely to revive questions about whether Pakistan should take more military action to eliminate Islamist groups and whether attempts at reconciliation and peace deals in parts of the northwest are flawed.

Taliban bombers have killed thousands of Pakistani soldiers and civilians over the last five years, but many in the country blame the United States and its 2001 invasion of neighboring Afghanistan for the violence.

The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan said the attack was "a wake-up call, if another one was needed, for those pining to appease the extremists and going out of their way to advocate making peace with the Taliban".

The United States, which uses drone attacks to target Taliban and al-Qaida in Pakistan, also condemned the shooting as "barbaric" and "cowardly".