\'I am so happy with my new face\' says abused Afghan girl

Aisha's photo first appeared on the front cover of Time Magazine in August 2010 A young Afghan woman whose nose and ears were cut off by her abusive husband has revealed the results of the reconstructive surgery to rebuild her face. Aesha Mohammadzai became famous for her plight after

her picture appeared on the cover of Time magazine.
Her nose and ears were sliced off by her husband as punishment for running away from her abusive marriage. Aesha was married off at the age of 12 to a Taliban fighter, as payment for a debt her father owed. Three years later, the 19-year-old girl now has a new face and life.
As part of a life-changing treatment, doctors placed an inflatable silicone shell under the skin of her forehead, gradually filling it with fluid in order to expand her skin and provide them with extra tissue for her new nose.
They have also taken tissue from her forearm and transplanted it to her face to form the inner lining and lower part of the nose.
 Despite her wounds healing, Aesha will always live with the scars of her horrific ordeal.
Speaking for the first time on British television channel ITV, she described the story of the abuse leading up to the tragic incident.
“Every day I was abused by my husband and his family. Mentally and physically. Then one day it became unbearable so I ran away. They caught me and put me in jail for five months. When I came out the judge sent me back to my husband. That night they took me to the mountains,” she recalled.

“They tied my hands and my feet. They said my punishment was to cut my nose and ears. And then they started to do it,” she said.
Left for dead in the mountains, she managed to crawl to her grandfather's house and her father took her to an American medical facility, where medics cared for her for ten weeks.
They then transported Aesha to a secret shelter in Kabul and in August 2010, she was flown to the US by the Grossman Burn Foundation to stay with a host family.
Aesha now considers her new guardians as family and said she is 'happy' with her new nose. She wants her experience to tell a story of hope.
“I want to tell all women who are suffering abuse to be strong. Never give up and don’t lose hope,” she said.
Aesha’s story first appeared in Time magazine in 2010. The magazine published a haunting cover photo of her - horrifying people around the world and symbolising the plight of Afghan women.
Latest figures by the UN estimate that nearly 90 percent of Afghanistan's women suffer domestic abuse.