TORONTO: Nobel Peace laureate Malala Yousafzai returned to Canada on Wednesday to receive her honorary citizenship and address the country’s lawmakers after her first visit to Parliament in 2014 was put off because of a terror attack.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau presented her with a framed certificate of citizenship. She’s only the sixth person to receive the honor and the youngest ever.
The 19-year-old Pakistani activist was 15 when she shot in the head by Taliban militants while returning from school. She was targeted for advocating women’s education.
She won world acclaim for her campaign and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014.
Malala originally was scheduled to receive honorary citizenship in October 2014, but the Canadian Parliament was stormed by an armed terrorist that day. The gunman killed a soldier standing guard at Ottawa’s war memorial shortly before storming Parliament in an attack that was stopped cold when he was shot to death.
“The man who attacked Parliament Hill called himself a Muslim — but he did not share my faith. He did not share the faith of one and a half billion Muslims living in peace around the world. He did not share our Islam — a religion of learning, compassion and mercy,” she said to applause.
Malala also praised Canada for welcoming more than 40,000 Syrian refugees, and appeared to add an appeal to the US as well.
“I pray that you continue to open your homes and your hearts to the world’s most defenseless children and families,” she said, “and I hope your neighbors will follow your example.”
And she joked about Trudeau, Canada’s 45-year-old prime minister.
“People are always talking about how young he is. They say he is the second youngest prime minister in Canada’s history. He does yoga, he has tattoos,” she said. “When I was coming here everyone was telling me to shake his hand and let us know how he looks in reality. People were just so excited for me to meet Trudeau. I don’t think anyone cared about the Canadian honorary citizenship.”
The other five honorary citizens are the Dalai Lama, the Aga Khan, Nelson Mandela, Burmese activist Aung San Suu Kyi and Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg.
Malala Yousafzai given honorary Canadian citizenship
Malala Yousafzai given honorary Canadian citizenship
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Russia and Ukraine trade attacks as US and European officials prepare for peace talks
Moscow pounded Ukrainian power infrastructure with drone and missile strikes on Saturday and Kyiv launched a deadly strike of its own on southwestern Russia, a day before talks involving senior European and US officials aimed at ending the war were set to resume.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukrainian, US and European officials will hold a series of meetings in Berlin in the coming days, adding that he will personally meet with US President Donald Trump’s envoys.
“Most importantly, I will be meeting with envoys of President Trump, and there will also be meetings with our European partners, with many leaders, concerning the foundation of peace — a political agreement to end the war,” Zelensky said in an address to the nation late Saturday.
Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and his son-in-law Jared Kushner are traveling to Berlin for the talks, according to a White House official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
American officials have tried for months to navigate the demands of each side as Trump presses for a swift end to Russia’s war and grows increasingly exasperated by delays. The search for possible compromises has run into major obstacles, including which combatant will get control of Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region, which is mostly occupied by Russian forces.
“The chance is considerable at this moment, and it matters for our every city, for our every Ukrainian community,” Zelensky said. “We are working to ensure that peace for Ukraine is dignified, and to secure a guarantee — a guarantee, above all — that Russia will not return to Ukraine for a third invasion.”
As diplomats push for peace, the war grinds on.
Russia attacked five Ukrainian regions overnight, targeting the country’s energy and port infrastructure. Zelensky said the attacks involved more than 450 drones and 30 missiles. And with temperatures hovering around freezing, Ukraine’s interior minister, Ihor Klymenko, said more than a million people were without electricity.
An attack on Odesa caused grain silos to catch fire at the coastal city’s port, Ukrainian deputy prime minister and reconstruction minister Oleksiy Kuleba said. Two people were wounded in attacks on the wider Odesa region, according to regional head Oleh Kiper.
Kyiv and its allies say Russia is trying to cripple the Ukrainian power grid and deny civilians access to heat, light and running water for a fourth consecutive winter, in what Ukrainian officials call “weaponizing” the cold.
The drone attack in Russia’s Saratov region damaged a residential building and killed two people, said the regional governor, Roman Busargin, who didn’t offer further details. Busragin said the attack also shattered windows at a kindergarten and clinic. Russia’s Defense Ministry said it shot down 41 Ukrainian drones over Russian territory overnight.
On the front lines, Ukrainian forces said Saturday that the northern part of Pokrovsk was under Ukrainian control, despite Russia’s claims this month that it had taken full control of the critical city. The Associated Press was not able to independently verify the claims.
The latest attacks came after Kremlin foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov reaffirmed Friday that Moscow will give its blessing to a ceasefire only after Ukraine’s forces have withdrawn from parts of the Donetsk region that they still control.
Ukraine has consistently refused to cede the remaining part of the region to Russia.
Ushakov told the business daily Kommersant that Russian police and national guard troops would stay in parts of eastern Ukraine’s Donbas even if they become a demilitarized zone under a prospective peace plan — a demand likely to be rejected by Ukraine as US-led negotiations drag on.
Ushakov warned that a search for compromise could take a long time, noting that the US proposals that took into account Russian demands had been “worsened” by alterations proposed by Ukraine and its European allies.
“We don’t know what changes they are making, but clearly they aren’t for the better,” Ushakov said, adding: “We will strongly insist on our considerations.”
In other developments, about 480 people were evacuated Saturday from a train traveling between the Polish city of Przemysl and Kyiv after police received a call concerning a threat on the train, Karolina Kowalik, a spokesperson for the Przemysl police, told The Associated Press. Nobody was hurt and she didn’t elaborate on the threat.
Polish authorities are on high alert since multiple attempts to disrupt trains on the line linking Warsaw to the Ukrainian border, including the use of explosives in November, with Polish authorities saying they have evidence Russia was behind it.
