Malala Yousafzai before, during and after surgery at the QE, hospital, Birmingham, UK

Hero schoolgirl Malala Yousafzai who was shot in the head by the Taliban after campaigning for women's rights. The brave 15-year-old underwent pioneering surgery over the weekend when surgeons attached a titanium plate to bridge a gap in her shattered skull. She was fitted with a titanium plate to repair her skull and a cochlear implant to help her recover the hearing in her left ear. The surgery, at Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham, took five hours and yesterday she was recovering well. She was flown to the UK after a Taliban assassin barged onto her school bus in Pakistan and fired at her at point blank range. She was targeted after she heroically spoke out against the regime and called for greater women's rights in the country. Incredibly, she survived and was admitted to Birmingham's Queen Elizabeth Hospital -- which usually treats soldiers shot or blown up on the battle field.