U.S. President Barack Obama has met at the White House with Pakistani teenage activist Malala Yousafzai, who was attacked by the Taliban for her efforts to promote education for girls.
The president and first lady Michelle Obama met the 16-year-old on Friday, the same day the Nobel committee awarded its Peace Prize.
Malala was seen as a favorite to win the award; however, the prize went to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, which is currently working to destroy Syria's arsenal.
The White House says the president wanted to thank Malala for her work on behalf of girls' education in Pakistan.
Malala was 11 when she became an activist for women's education, freedom, and self-determination in Pakistan's Swat Valley, where the Taliban banned women from attending school in 2009.
She began a blog, writing under a pseudonym, and quickly became a prominent voice for women's rights.
Malala and a classmate were shot while returning home from school in the Swat Valley last year, in an attack that brought her campaign for children's education to the global forefront.
In an interview Friday with the U.S. Public Broadcasting Service, Malala said she has been given a second life for the cause of education.
On Thursday, Malala won the European Union's Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought.
Malala's new book, I am Malala, was published earlier this week.
The president and first lady Michelle Obama met the 16-year-old on Friday, the same day the Nobel committee awarded its Peace Prize.
Malala was seen as a favorite to win the award; however, the prize went to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, which is currently working to destroy Syria's arsenal.
The White House says the president wanted to thank Malala for her work on behalf of girls' education in Pakistan.
Malala was 11 when she became an activist for women's education, freedom, and self-determination in Pakistan's Swat Valley, where the Taliban banned women from attending school in 2009.
She began a blog, writing under a pseudonym, and quickly became a prominent voice for women's rights.
Malala and a classmate were shot while returning home from school in the Swat Valley last year, in an attack that brought her campaign for children's education to the global forefront.
In an interview Friday with the U.S. Public Broadcasting Service, Malala said she has been given a second life for the cause of education.
On Thursday, Malala won the European Union's Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought.
Malala's new book, I am Malala, was published earlier this week.
