The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have spoken with activist Malala Yousafzai about the challenges girls around the world face accessing education in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.

Harry and Meghan’s video chat with the renowned 23-year-old education campaigner will be released on Sunday to mark International Day Of The Girl.

The trio spoke about how the Covid-19 outbreak has had a disproportionate impact on young women’s access to education.

Before the pandemic, around 130 million girls around the world were not in school.

But research by the Malala Fund has suggested 20 million more secondary-school aged girls may never return to the classroom following the health crisis.

The full video will be released on the fund’s YouTube Channel and website on Sunday October 11 at 4pm UK time.

Ms Yousafzai was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman at the age of 15 after campaigning for girls to be educated in her native Pakistan.

She later founded the non-profit fund to support her work raising awareness of the difficulties facing girls accessing education, and went on to become the youngest-ever Nobel Peace Prize winner in 2014.

The duchess has long campaigned on female education and has spoken of how a lack of access to education is the single most important barrier to gender equality.

Meanwhile, a spoof website has been set up promoting former Suits star Meghan as a candidate for the 2020 US presidential election, The Sun reported online.

Meghanforpresident.com features images of the duchess with mottos including “Together, we will lead” and “A brighter tomorrow begins today”.

The former senior working royal has been vocal about encouraging people to vote in the US.

A source close to the couple said: “It’s obviously fake.

“I would encourage people not to give it more attention than it deserves – especially as it’s collecting people’s email addresses and encouraging people to spoil ballots.”

Bookmakers have already been offering odds of 50/1 for Meghan to become the US president in four years’ time.

Harry faced a backlash amid claims of political interference and suggestions that he was telling people to vote against Republican nominee President Donald Trump when he urged those in the US to vote and “reject hate speech”.