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On Friday, the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Pakistan’s Malala Yousafzai and India’s Kailash Satyarthi for their tireless work against the suppression of children and the right of all children to have an education.

Malala Yousafzai has long been known for standing up to the Taliban for the plight of girl’s education in the SWAT Valley of Pakistan. When she was 15, the Taliban shot her in the head for her tireless advocacy of ensuring girls get an education.

Kailash Satyarthi of India has been a tireless advocate by campaigning to end child labor and to free children from trafficking.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee in a press release stated, “Children must go to school and not be financially exploited. In the poor countries of the world, 60% of the present population is under 25 years of age. It is a prerequisite for peaceful global development that the rights of children and young people be respected. In conflict-ridden areas in particular, the violation of children leads to the continuation of violence from generation to generation.”

Writing in the New York Times, William Dalrymple commented, “We owe it to Malala and many others who share her ideals to refuse to allow the radicals to win the battle of perceptions. It is, and has always been, possible to be a Muslim Pashtun and to embrace nonviolence and a prominent role for women in public affairs. Indeed the greatest weapon we have in the war on terrorism in that region is the courage and the decency of the vast proportion of the people who live there.”

It’s fitting that the Nobel Prize was awarded to two individuals from nations with a long simmering hatred for each and both with nuclear weapons poised to destroy the other.

The Washington Post reported that Yousafzai repeatedly praised her co-winner — while acknowledging that she did not know how to pronounce his last name — and seemed to revel in the symbolism of awarding the prize to recipients on both sides of one of the world’s most intractable conflicts.

“One is from Pakistan, one is from India. One believes in Hinduism, one strongly believes in Islam. And it gives a message to people, gives a message to people of love between Pakistan and India and between different religions, and we both support each other,” she said. “It does not matter what’s the color of your skin, what language do you speak, what religion you believe in.”

The Post continued, The Nobel committee praised Yousafzai and Satyarthi “for their struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education.”

It also cast an eye toward hopes for peace on the South Asian subcontinent. In recent days, the two nations have exchanged fire over a disputed border region in some of the most serious clashes in years.

Even as the Economist reported, “Though the recipients are both South Asian, and both promote the interests of children, there is little reason to expect any relief from the long-standing and bitter confrontation that divides their nuclear-armed countries. Others will have to work on bilateral peace. No doubt the Nobel committee would be willing to dish out another award to a couple of South Asian winners, if progress were to be made on that front, too.”

You have to start somewhere and the awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to these two individuals is a fitting tribute to what the peace prize should represent.