Arrests made in teen's shooting by Taliban

MINGORA, Pakistan -- Pakistani police have arrested a number of suspects in the case of a 14-year-old girl shot and wounded by the Taliban after promoting girls' education and speaking out about Taliban atrocities, a senior police official said yesterday.

The shooting of Malala Yousafzai along with two classmates while they were on their way home from school Tuesday horrified people in Pakistan and internationally. The shooting has been followed by an outpouring of respect for a girl who earned the enmity of the Taliban for publicizing their acts and speaking about the importance of girls' education.

The Taliban have claimed responsibility for the shooting, saying Yousafzai was promoting "Western thinking." Providing more details, a Taliban spokesman said the top leadership of the Taliban's Swat Valley chapter decided two months ago to kill Yousafzai in a carefully planned attack after her family ignored repeated warnings.

Local Taliban leader Maulana Fazlullah and his deputies selected three attackers, including two trained snipers, who carefully studied the girl's route home from school, the spokesman said.

Afzal Khan Afridi, police chief in the town of Mingora, where the shooting took place, said arrests had been made, but he declined to give any details about the number of people detained or what role they're suspected of having in the shooting. He said he didn't want to endanger the ongoing investigation.

Yousafzai wrote about the Taliban in a journal for the BBC. After the Taliban were pushed out of the valley in 2009 by the Pakistani military, she became even more outspoken in advocating for girls' education.

Yousafzai is now being treated at a military hospital in the city of Rawalpindi. A military spokesman says her condition is satisfactory but the next 36-48 hours would be crucial.