Malala insists that what the Taliban do transgresses against the true teachings of Islam; yet those who adhere to what she regards as those true teachings do not have sufficient numbers or power to protect an event that was to be held in her honor at Peshawar University. Those whom she regards as Misunderstanders of Islam are ruling the day.
“Pakistani University Cancels Event Promoting Teenager’s Memoir,” by Ismail Khan and Salman Masoodjan for the New York Times, January 28 (thanks to Kenneth):
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Malala Yousafzai may be a global celebrity, but in her home province, she remains a focus of controversy.
On Tuesday, officials at Peshawar University said that ministers in the provincial government of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa had forced them to cancel a ceremony to promote Ms. Yousafzai’s memoir, “I Am Malala,” which relates her experiences as a schoolgirl advocating education for girls and surviving an attempted assassination by the Pakistani Taliban. The book, published last year, is a best seller in the West but is not widely available in Pakistan, especially in the conservative northwest.
Officials at the university’s Area Study Center, where the event was to be held, said they had come under pressure from the provincial government, including Shah Farman, the minister of information, to cancel the event, which was meant to formally introduce the book to the region. The government said it could not provide the necessary security for the event.
Ms. Yousafzai, 16, was not scheduled to appear in person. After she was shot in the head in 2012, she was flown to Britain for medical treatment, and she and her family have since settled there.
The cancellation drew widespread criticism. Even Imran Khan, the national leader of one of the political parties that governs the province, weighed in with dismay.
“I am at a loss 2 understand why Malala’s book launch stopped in Peshawar,” Mr. Khan wrote on Twitter. Using the initials for his party, the Pakistan Justice Party, he added, “PTI believes in freedom of speech/debate, not censorship of ideas.”
That makes the PTI a minority among the Islamic supremacists in Peshawar. Even American Leftists would have trouble agreeing with Imran Khan on this, so dedicated are they to shutting down their foes by force.