Pakistani girl shot by Taliban sent to UK for treatment

October 15, 2012 - Pakistan airlifted a 14-year-old girl who was shot and seriously wounded by the Taliban to the United Kingdom for treatment on Monday, a move that will give her access to the specialized medical care she needs to recover and also protect her from follow-up attacks threatened by the militants. The attack on Malala Yousufzai as she was returning home from school in Pakistan's northwest last Tuesday has horrified people both across the country and abroad. It has also sparked hope the government would respond by intensifying its fight against the Taliban and their allies. Malala will be treated at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham in central England, a center which has specialized in the treatment of troops wounded in Afghanistan, said British Prime Minister David Cameron's office. Malala was targeted by the Taliban for promoting girls' education and criticizing the militant group. Two of her classmates were also wounded when the Taliban fired on the schoolbus they were in while returning home. The Taliban said they attacked Malala because she was promoting “Western thinking” and have threatened to target her again until she is killed. Malala was flown out of Pakistan on Monday morning in a specially equipped air ambulance provided by the United Arab Emirates, said the Pakistani military, which has been treating the young girl at one of its hospitals. A panel of doctors recommended that Malala be shifted to a center in the United Kingdom that has the ability to provide “integrated”' care to children who have sustained severe injuries, said a military statement. Malala wrote about the Taliban practices in a blog for the BBC under a pseudonym when she was just 11. After the Taliban were pushed out of the Swat 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.