Pakistani education activist Malala Yousafzai and Indian child rights campaigner Kailash Satyarthi have received the Nobel Peace Prize awards. The Nobel committee described both laureates as “champions of peace”. Speaking earlier to the BBC, Ms Yousafzai said she would consider pursuing a career in politics if it was the best way to serve her country. Mr Satyarthi said receiving the prize was “a great opportunity” to further his work against child slavery. Ms Yousafzai and Mr Satyarthi received their awards from the chairman of the Norwegian Nobel committee, in the presence of King Harald V of Norway. They are delivering their Nobel lectures during the award ceremony. ‘Indescribable courage’ In his speech, Mr Satyarthi said he was “representing the sound of silence” and the “millions of those children who are left behind”. He said he had kept an empty chair at the ceremony as a reminder of the children without a voice. “There is no greater violence than to deny the dreams of our children,” he said. “I refuse to accept that the shackles of slavery can ever be stronger than the quest for freedom,” he added, to applause. The Nobel committee chairman Thorbjorn Jagland stressed the importance of education, saying: “The road to democracy and freedom is paved with knowledge.” Mr Jagland praised Mr Satyarthi’s work campaigning against child labour, often at great risk to himself. He also lauded Ms Yousafzai’s efforts to promote education despite threats from the Taliban, saying: “Her courage is almost indescribable”. Ms Yousafzai, 17, was shot in the head by Taliban gunmen in October 2012 for campaigning for girls’ education and now lives in the UK. She is the youngest ever recipient of the prize. Ms Yousafzai is accompanied in Norway by a delegation of school girls – including the two classmates shot alongside her by the Taliban, the BBC’s Orla Guerin in Oslo reports. Malala Yousafzai: “If I can serve my country best through politics and through becoming a prime minister, then I would definitely choose that” Through the efforts of Mr Satyarthi, 60, tens of thousands of children have been rescued from hazardous industries. He has endured death threats for his work, and two of his colleagues were killed. Ms Yousafzai and Mr Satyarthi were jointly awarded the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize “for their struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education”. They have split the $1.4m (£860,000) prize money. The Nobel committee said earlier it was important that a Muslim and a Hindu, a Pakistani and an Indian, had joined in what it called a common struggle for education and against extremism. –BBC, Online
