Taliban shooting victim Malala Yousafzai reunited in Britain with friend who was wounded in the attack

FORMER Prime Minister Gordon Brown, now UN Special Envoy for Global Education, paid tribute to the courage of Malala's 15-year-old friend Shazia Ramzan.

A SCHOOLGIRL shot by the Taliban in the same infamous bus attack as Malala Yousafzai has been reunited with her friend in Britain.

Shazia Ramzan, 15, was given permission to complete her medical studies in the UK because of escalating violence in Pakistan. She hugged her close pal Malala at Birmingham airport as they came face to face for the first time since the shooting.

Shazia, whose family faced months of intimidation in her own country, said: "I am so grateful for the opportunity to study here and try to become a doctor."

"It's so sad that there are millions of girls around the world in my situation. I want every girl to go to school.”

Shazia was on the school bus on October 9 last year when Taliban gunmen went looking for Malala, a vocal campaigner for girls' education. Malala, who is also 15, was shot in the head while Shazia suffered gun wounds to the neck and shoulder.

Malala was airlifted to Birmingham soon after the attack. But Shazia stayed in Pakistan, unable to go to school because of continued threats to her life. Living under constant guard, her education was virtually impossible to continue.

Now, following the recent surge of violence with last month's massacre of female university students in Quetta and the double murder of two sisters for filming themselves dancing, Shazia has been granted a student visa by the UK.

With support from the Office of Gordon and Sarah Brown and other charities, including a scholarship from her new school, she has gained a place to complete her studies. Her ambition is to return to Pakistan as a qualified doctor.

Shazia continued: "I wanted so much to stay in Pakistan and complete my education but constant threats made this impossible.

“I have already raised the issue with the Pakistani Prime Minister calling for action for girls to stay on at school.”

Gordon Brown, UN Special Envoy for Global Education, who first spoke with Shazia when he visited Pakistan in the wake of the attack and has supported her since, said: "Shazia is a remarkably brave young woman and I am delighted she can now safely complete her education here in the UK.

"It is an outrage that a young girl can be threatened, intimated and deterred from going to school. Shazia has told me that she is now more determined than ever to speak up for a girl's right to an education. Thirty-two million girls around the world don't go to school and we must stand side by side with girls like Shazia and Malala to change that."

Malala, who has become a global icon for the right to education, last month launched a petition on aworldatschool.org calling on world leaders to find school places for the 57 million girls and boys who currently go without, including seven million in Pakistan.

Presenting the petition to Ban Ki-moon on July 12 - her 16th birthday - she will address a youth takeover of the United Nations in what has been declared Malala Day.

DR