ISLAMABAD: Reach all Women in War (RAW) Anna Politkovskaya Award on Thursday was awarded to Gulalai Ismail, a Pashtun women’s rights activist from Swabi, alongside senior Indian journalist, Gauri Lankesh, according to a report by RAW.
In 2002, Gulalai co-founded non-governmental organisation, Aware Girls, with her sister Saba Ismail. The organisation aims to challenge the culture of violence and the oppression of women in the rural Khyber Pakhtunkhwa area in the north-west of Pakistan “Speaking out for our rights and speaking out against religious extremism is our fundamental right,” Gulalai said as she accepted the award.
“While I receive this award, wars, gun violence, and genocides continue in many parts of the world. Refugee camps are becoming homes to millions of people. People are getting denied their right to self-determination. New brands of religious extremist organisations keep on emerging, with every new brand beholding much more severity of violence,” Gulalai added.
“No matter how dark the world is, there is hope as well,” she said.
“Gauri Lankesh… was killed for speaking truth to power,” Gulalai said about an Indian journalist who was posthumously given the Anna Politkovskaya Award along with Gulalai.
Gauri Lankesh, the editor and publisher of the Kannada language Gauri Lankesh Patrike, was shot dead by unidentified assailants near her home in the southern city of Bengaluru, India.
She was a critic of the federal government and wrote extensively about secularism.
“While I receive this award, India and Pakistan complete 70 years of their separation, and you are reminding the world again that even today we have similar hopes, aspirations and struggles,” Gulalai said as she completed her acceptance speech.
Pakistan’s teenage Nobel laureate, Malala Yousafzai, who won the award in 2013, said about Gulalai’s work: “Through Aware Girls, Gulalai is training young women to advocate for their rights. Her work is fostering the next generation of female leaders in our country.”