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British police have questioned two people who tried to visit a hospitalized Pakistani teenager shot for promoting girls' education, raising fears about her safety following pledges by the Taliban to make another attempt on her life.
Fourteen-year-old Malala Yousufzai was shot in the head by the Taliban last week as she was returning home from school in Pakistan. She was airlifted Monday to Britain to receive specialized medical care and protection from follow-up attacks threatened by the militants.
Medical Director Dr. Dave Rosser of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham stressed Tuesday that security was "under control" at the hospital after the overnight incident. He said several people had turned up at the hospital claiming to be the girl's relatives but didn't get very far.
He said the people were arrested, but police said they had only been questioned.
"We don't believe there's any threat to her personal security," Rosser told journalists, explaining the hospital did not believe the suspects were related to Malala. "We think it's probably people being over-curious."
Police would not immediately confirm the details of the incident.
Malala was targeted by the Taliban for promoting girls' education and criticizing the militant group's behaviour when they took over the scenic Swat Valley where she lived. Two of her classmates were also wounded in the attack and are receiving treatment in Pakistan.
The attack on the girls horrified people in Pakistan and across the world. Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari said Malala had become "a symbol of all that is good in us."
"The work she did is far higher before God than that which is being done by terrorists in the name of religion," he said at the Economic Cooperation Organization Summit in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan. "We will continue her bright work."
Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik has announced a $1 million bounty for Pakistani Taliban spokesman Ahsanullah Ahsan, saying he was the one who announced that the Taliban carried out the attack on Malala.
The Taliban has threatened to target Malala until she is killed because she promotes "Western thinking."
Rosser said Malala is proving to be strong so far, but did not elaborate about her recovery.
Doctors are optimistic that Malala's age is in her favour. Unlike adults, the brains of teenagers are still growing and better able to adapt to trauma.
Teens also are generally healthier and their bodies have a stronger ability to react to the disruption that the injury causes, said Dr. Jonathan Fellus, chief scientific officer at the New Jersey-based International Brain Research Foundation.
"It helps to be young and resilient to weather that storm," he said. "Because her brain is continuing to develop at that age, she may have more flexibility in the brain."
There's also a psychological aspect to why youngsters have a better shot at recovery. While injured adults often mourn the loss of what they had, teens don't know what they are missing.
"They have an amazing capacity for hope," Fellus said. In Malala's case, her strong personality would also help her recover, he added.
Students in Lahore, Pakistan hold placards showing support for schoolgirl Malala Yousufzai, who was shot on October 9 by the Taliban. (Mohsin Raza/Reuters)Still, doctors cautioned that it is impossible to say how Malala will do without knowing the path of the bullet and what damages it caused, details that have not been released.
"The brain is like real estate," said Dr. Anders Cohen, chief of neurosurgery at The Brooklyn Hospital Center in New York. "Location is everything.
"Based on the information we have, it appears that Malala was shot from the front down diagonally, but we don't know what part of the brain the bullet went through, whether it crossed the midline and hit any vessels, or whether the bullet passed through the right or left side of the brain."
But both physicians say it is extremely unlikely that a full recovery can be made. They could only hope that the bullet took a "lucky path" — going through a more "silent," or less active — part of the brain.
"You don't have a bullet go through your brain and have a full recovery," Fellus said.
British police have questioned two people who tried to visit a hospitalized Pakistani teenager shot for promoting girls' education, raising fears about her safety following pledges by the Taliban to make another attempt on her life.
Fourteen-year-old Malala Yousufzai was shot in the head by the Taliban last week as she was returning home from school in Pakistan. She was airlifted Monday to Britain to receive specialized medical care and protection from follow-up attacks threatened by the militants.
Medical Director Dr. Dave Rosser of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham stressed Tuesday that security was "under control" at the hospital after the overnight incident. He said several people had turned up at the hospital claiming to be the girl's relatives but didn't get very far.
He said the people were arrested, but police said they had only been questioned.
"We don't believe there's any threat to her personal security," Rosser told journalists, explaining the hospital did not believe the suspects were related to Malala. "We think it's probably people being over-curious."
Police would not immediately confirm the details of the incident.
Malala was targeted by the Taliban for promoting girls' education and criticizing the militant group's behaviour when they took over the scenic Swat Valley where she lived. Two of her classmates were also wounded in the attack and are receiving treatment in Pakistan.
The attack on the girls horrified people in Pakistan and across the world. Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari said Malala had become "a symbol of all that is good in us."
"The work she did is far higher before God than that which is being done by terrorists in the name of religion," he said at the Economic Cooperation Organization Summit in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan. "We will continue her bright work."
Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik has announced a $1 million bounty for Pakistani Taliban spokesman Ahsanullah Ahsan, saying he was the one who announced that the Taliban carried out the attack on Malala.
The Taliban has threatened to target Malala until she is killed because she promotes "Western thinking."
Rosser said Malala is proving to be strong so far, but did not elaborate about her recovery.
Doctors are optimistic that Malala's age is in her favour. Unlike adults, the brains of teenagers are still growing and better able to adapt to trauma.
Teens also are generally healthier and their bodies have a stronger ability to react to the disruption that the injury causes, said Dr. Jonathan Fellus, chief scientific officer at the New Jersey-based International Brain Research Foundation.
"It helps to be young and resilient to weather that storm," he said. "Because her brain is continuing to develop at that age, she may have more flexibility in the brain."
There's also a psychological aspect to why youngsters have a better shot at recovery. While injured adults often mourn the loss of what they had, teens don't know what they are missing.
"They have an amazing capacity for hope," Fellus said. In Malala's case, her strong personality would also help her recover, he added.
Students in Lahore, Pakistan hold placards showing support for schoolgirl Malala Yousufzai, who was shot on October 9 by the Taliban. (Mohsin Raza/Reuters)Still, doctors cautioned that it is impossible to say how Malala will do without knowing the path of the bullet and what damages it caused, details that have not been released.
"The brain is like real estate," said Dr. Anders Cohen, chief of neurosurgery at The Brooklyn Hospital Center in New York. "Location is everything.
"Based on the information we have, it appears that Malala was shot from the front down diagonally, but we don't know what part of the brain the bullet went through, whether it crossed the midline and hit any vessels, or whether the bullet passed through the right or left side of the brain."
But both physicians say it is extremely unlikely that a full recovery can be made. They could only hope that the bullet took a "lucky path" — going through a more "silent," or less active — part of the brain.
"You don't have a bullet go through your brain and have a full recovery," Fellus said.
Australian authorities are thanking the crew of an Air Canada flight for helping to locate a sailor in distress off the country's east coast.
The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) said Tuesday it received an emergency beacon activation at 8:15 a.m. local time, coming from approximately 270 nautical miles (500 kilometres) east of Sydney.
The AMSA requested Air Canada Flight AC033, a Boeing 777 en route from Vancouver to Sydney with 270 passengers and 18 crew aboard, to divert to the area of the beacon.
"The location of the beacon was within a flight path, so we needed to assess the situation and the Boeing 777 was the closest asset available to us," Jo Meehan of the AMSA told the Australian Broadcasting Corp.
The Offshore Patrol Vessel Nemesis from the New South Wales Police headed for the location of a sailor in distress off the east coast of Australia. (Wikipedia)Capt. Andrew Robertson, of Vancouver, who was piloting the Air Canada flight, says he was contacted by Australian air traffic control and asked to help.
"There's a ship, a yacht in distress, may have sunk, and you are the closest aircraft. Would you be able to assist," was the message Robertson said he received.
He asked for the location of the boat so that he and his crew could determine if they had the fuel to search for the boat in distress.
"Once we'd put that into our computer ... we actually determined that we had the fuel," Robertson said.
He noted that the aircraft's flight management system doesn't take into account dropping in altitude and then climbing back up, but Robertson said the crew believed they had enough fuel.
The Air Canada flight crew was using binoculars provided by passengers to look for the yacht as Robertson took the plane down to about 5,000 feet.
"I made a PA announcement to ask the passengers [to watch for the boat] because it's like looking for a needle in a haystack," he said.
"Almost right away, my first officer spotted something," Robertson said, adding that at 5,000 feet is was hard to make out any details.
"So I went from 5,000 down to 3,700 feet ... and they saw what they thought initially were three people on the deck, but it turns out there was only one," he said.
Robertson said the 777 is a big plane to be down at that level doing search and rescue.
"The passengers were awesome," Robertson said, adding he heard no complaints about the detour.
Air Canada spokesman Peter Fitzpatrick said everybody on board was "really happy and excited by the outcome," even though it delayed the flight by roughly 90 minutes.
With the boat's location confirmed, a police vessel was dispatched to the demasted yacht, which was running low on fuel and drifting further out to sea.
Robertson said he understood the sailor aboard the yacht was rescued a few hours later.
"It was very exciting," he said.
Canadian singer Jill Barber, who was on the Air Canada flight, tweeted: "It was not what I'd call an uneventful @AirCanada flight to Australia. Very impressed with the response of captain, crew and passengers!"
Yacht was low on fuelAn Air New Zealand A320 en route to Sydney from Auckland was also asked to divert to the area, confirm the yacht's position and get more details on the situation.
"It is believed the solo yachtsman left Pittwater, Sydney, two weeks ago heading for Eden in New South Wales, but had been drifting away from land since last week," Australian authorities said.
Pittwater is a part of Sydney's Northern Beaches region.
A merchant vessel, the ANL Benalla, arrived alongside the yacht later in the afternoon to provide shelter from strong winds until a police vessel from Sydney could reach the sailor Tuesday evening.
An AMSA spokeswoman said it was unusual for commercial aircraft to be called in to assist in a search and rescue effort.
"It's not common, but that's not because we try to avoid doing it," she told the Australian Associated Press. "It's because the nature of the incidents that we have aren't necessarily so remote that we can only rely on the commercial airlines."
The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) said Tuesday it received an emergency beacon activation at 8:15 a.m. local time, coming from approximately 270 nautical miles (500 kilometres) east of Sydney.
The AMSA requested Air Canada Flight AC033, a Boeing 777 en route from Vancouver to Sydney with 270 passengers and 18 crew aboard, to divert to the area of the beacon.
"The location of the beacon was within a flight path, so we needed to assess the situation and the Boeing 777 was the closest asset available to us," Jo Meehan of the AMSA told the Australian Broadcasting Corp.
The Offshore Patrol Vessel Nemesis from the New South Wales Police headed for the location of a sailor in distress off the east coast of Australia. (Wikipedia)Capt. Andrew Robertson, of Vancouver, who was piloting the Air Canada flight, says he was contacted by Australian air traffic control and asked to help.
"There's a ship, a yacht in distress, may have sunk, and you are the closest aircraft. Would you be able to assist," was the message Robertson said he received.
He asked for the location of the boat so that he and his crew could determine if they had the fuel to search for the boat in distress.
"Once we'd put that into our computer ... we actually determined that we had the fuel," Robertson said.
He noted that the aircraft's flight management system doesn't take into account dropping in altitude and then climbing back up, but Robertson said the crew believed they had enough fuel.
The Air Canada flight crew was using binoculars provided by passengers to look for the yacht as Robertson took the plane down to about 5,000 feet.
"I made a PA announcement to ask the passengers [to watch for the boat] because it's like looking for a needle in a haystack," he said.
"Almost right away, my first officer spotted something," Robertson said, adding that at 5,000 feet is was hard to make out any details.
"So I went from 5,000 down to 3,700 feet ... and they saw what they thought initially were three people on the deck, but it turns out there was only one," he said.
Robertson said the 777 is a big plane to be down at that level doing search and rescue.
"The passengers were awesome," Robertson said, adding he heard no complaints about the detour.
Air Canada spokesman Peter Fitzpatrick said everybody on board was "really happy and excited by the outcome," even though it delayed the flight by roughly 90 minutes.
With the boat's location confirmed, a police vessel was dispatched to the demasted yacht, which was running low on fuel and drifting further out to sea.
Robertson said he understood the sailor aboard the yacht was rescued a few hours later.
"It was very exciting," he said.
Canadian singer Jill Barber, who was on the Air Canada flight, tweeted: "It was not what I'd call an uneventful @AirCanada flight to Australia. Very impressed with the response of captain, crew and passengers!"
Yacht was low on fuelAn Air New Zealand A320 en route to Sydney from Auckland was also asked to divert to the area, confirm the yacht's position and get more details on the situation.
"It is believed the solo yachtsman left Pittwater, Sydney, two weeks ago heading for Eden in New South Wales, but had been drifting away from land since last week," Australian authorities said.
Pittwater is a part of Sydney's Northern Beaches region.
A merchant vessel, the ANL Benalla, arrived alongside the yacht later in the afternoon to provide shelter from strong winds until a police vessel from Sydney could reach the sailor Tuesday evening.
An AMSA spokeswoman said it was unusual for commercial aircraft to be called in to assist in a search and rescue effort.
"It's not common, but that's not because we try to avoid doing it," she told the Australian Associated Press. "It's because the nature of the incidents that we have aren't necessarily so remote that we can only rely on the commercial airlines."
Kenya policemen seriously injured in grenade attackKenya has been hit by a series of attacks since sending troops to join the fight against al-Shabab
At least 10 Kenyan policemen have been seriously injured in a grenade attack.
The officers were searching a house in Coast state near Mombasa, where they found weapons including an AK-47 rifle and two grenades.
A police spokesperson said Somalia-based Islamists al-Shabab may have been behind the incident.
Kenya has been hit by a series of grenade and gun attacks since it sent troops into Somalia to help fight the al-Qaeda-linked group last year.
Aggrey Adoli, the head of police for Coast province, told reporters that three suspects were also killed in the exchange of fire following the attack.
Suspected al-Shabab supporters have carried out a number of attacks over the past year in the Coast region, a popular tourist destination.
Kenyan troops have been fighting against the group alongside their Somali counterparts under the banner of African Union forces since October 2011.
At the end of last month they took al-Shabab's last Somali stronghold, the strategic port city of Kismayu.
At least 10 Kenyan policemen have been seriously injured in a grenade attack.
The officers were searching a house in Coast state near Mombasa, where they found weapons including an AK-47 rifle and two grenades.
A police spokesperson said Somalia-based Islamists al-Shabab may have been behind the incident.
Kenya has been hit by a series of grenade and gun attacks since it sent troops into Somalia to help fight the al-Qaeda-linked group last year.
Aggrey Adoli, the head of police for Coast province, told reporters that three suspects were also killed in the exchange of fire following the attack.
Suspected al-Shabab supporters have carried out a number of attacks over the past year in the Coast region, a popular tourist destination.
Kenyan troops have been fighting against the group alongside their Somali counterparts under the banner of African Union forces since October 2011.
At the end of last month they took al-Shabab's last Somali stronghold, the strategic port city of Kismayu.
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