It’s an emotional return for Malala Yousafzai. Six years ago she was shot in the head by the Taliban in her native Pakistan, for advocating female education.
On Thursday she returned to her homeland for the first time since the attack.
The Nobel Prize winner was welcomed by Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi.
Her visit is expected to last several days, traveling with her father and younger brother, but it’s unlikely she’ll go to her home region of Swat, in the mountains northwest of Islamabad.
Relatives and security sources say security threats against her make that impossible.
In October 2012, masked gunmen stopped a bus taking Malala and some friends home from school and shot her.
The Pakistani Taliban, who seized control of her home district in 2009, claimed the attack and said it was in response to a blog she wrote for the BBC Urdu service advocating girls’ education.
After surviving the attack, Malala was flown to the UK and underwent surgery.
Unable to return home, she stayed in Britain and set up the Malala Fund supporting education advocacy groups.
At the age of just 17, she became the youngest winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.
Now 20, she is a student at the University of Oxford.
But, she remains a divisive figure back home, frequently criticized by religious conservatives who say she gives their country a bad name.
