Pakistanis react to militant's letter to Malala

http://centralasiaonline.com/

Targeting the innocent for ideological differences is a negation of Islamic teachings and a crime against humanity, observers say.

Pakistanis were quick to reject Tehreek-e-Taliban (TTP) commander Adnan Rasheed's message to teen education activist and peace advocate Malala Yousafzai.Malala is a proud symbol of the Pashtun code of life, Acid Survivors Foundation chief Valerie Khan Yousafzai told Central Asia Online, adding that "extremists' allegations [against] her … are just rubbish" and that "Malala is an agent of change – and good change, for which we are all proud of her." Rasheed July 15 wrote a letter to Malala, now 16, in which he said that the October 9 TTP attack on her in Mingora was fully justified.

"The entire nation is proud of Malala Yousafzai," KP Information and Health Minister Shaukat Yousafzai told Central Asia Online. "She is a beacon for women's education in Pakistan." The brutal attack on her and the letter have no justification, he said. In the letter, Rasheed called Malala's activism for female empowerment "more destructive than any other weapon" and said she should return to her hometown of Mingora, where she was nearly killed, attend an all-female Islamic seminary and study only the Koran. Girls like Malala were not afraid of such cowardly threats by militants and were ready to offer any sacrifice, Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP)-affiliated Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Assembly member Nighat Aurakzai said.

"Such wrong justifications and threats cannot stop us from furthering the cause that Malala has infused in every woman's mind," she said. Militants condemned for attention-seeking and hypocrisy Rasheed wrote the letter three days after Malala, a Nobel Peace Prize nominee, spoke to the UN Youth Assembly about the importance of educating everybody. The letter's timing was no coincidence, Aurakzai said, adding that it shows that the militants wanted to remain in the headlines by trying to garner cheap publicity. Pakistani citizens were quick to point out the hypocrisy in the militants' actions. The letter exemplifies the mind-set of militants who violate their own self-proclaimed codes of Islam, Shaukat said. The letter is more proof that militants fear people getting an education "since it would expose their true face to society," Gulalai Khan, a programme manager for a women's-rights organisation in KP and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), said. Targeting anyone, especially young girls, on the basis of ideological disagreement has no justification, Zainab Azmat, a member of the National Commission on the Status of Women, said. "It's a civilised world now, and we have to live with mutual respect for all religions and ideologies," she said.