Malala Yousafzai made youngest UN Messenger of Peace

United Nations (UN) Secretary General Antonio Guterres has bestowed the highest honour UN Messenger of Peace upon Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai.
She was described as a symbol of the most important thing in the world-education for all. With this, she became youngest ever UN Messenger of Peace.

About Malala Yousafzai

• Malala was born on 12 July 1997 in Mingora city in Swat province of Pakistan.
• At the age of 11 she had caught international attention as female education activist after writing for the BBC about life under the Taliban in Pakistan under pseudonym Gul Makai.
• Her campaign had led to a Taliban assassination attempt near that left her severely wounded after she was shot in head in 2012.
• Awards and Honours: In 2014, at the age of 17 she was awarded Nobel peace prize, becoming youngest Nobel Laureate in the history of Nobel award.
• National Youth Peace Prize (2011), Mother Teresa Awards for Social Justice (2012), Simon de Beauvoir Prize (2013), Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought (2013), Anna Politkovskaya Award (2013).
• UN has declared  12 July as ‘Malala Day’ in her honour.

About UN Messenger of Peace

• The coveted title is bestowed by UN upon distinguished individuals, carefully selected from the fields of art, literature, music and sports or other fields of public life.
• The Messengers of Peace scheme was instigated in 1997 as a central addition to the system of UN goodwill ambassadors and honorary ambassadors, run by the different UN agencies since 1954.
• The messengers of peace are appointed directly by the Secretary-General of the UN and are intended to promote the work of the United Nations in general and
• Initially they were chosen for a period of three year, but three of the current twelve messengers, Michael Douglas, Jane Goodall, and Yo-Yo Ma have served for more than ten years.

Month: Current Affairs - April, 2017