Malala to pen life story

UK: Malala Yousafzai, the teenage girl shot by the Taliban for promoting girls' education, is to tell her life story in a book due out later this year, the publishers said Thursday, in a deal reportedly worth around three million dollars.

The book will be entitled "I Am Malala".

"I hope the book will reach people around the world, so they realise how difficult it is for some children to get access to education," the 15-year-old Pakistani said in a statement.

"I want to tell my story, but it will also be the story of 61 million children who can't get education. I want it to be part of the campaign to give every boy and girl the right to go to school. It is their basic right." The deal is reportedly worth 2 million ($3 million, 2.4 million euros).

Malala was shot at point-blank range by a Taliban gunman as her school bus travelled through northwest Pakistan's Swat Valley on October 9 last year, in an attack that drew worldwide condemnation.

She was flown to Britain for surgery on her head injuries and, having recovered sufficiently, returned to school in Birmingham, central England earlier this month.

Malala has become a global symbol of the campaign for girls' right to an education and has been nominated for this year's Nobel Peace Prize.

AFP