29-Mar-2024  Srinagar booked.net

South Asia

Women Protest Over Closure Of High-Schools In Afghanistan’s Kabul

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Ahmad Sahel Arman/AFP


Kabul: More than two dozen girls and women staged protests in front of the Ministry of Education in the capital, Kabul against the closure of high- schools after the Taliban 2.0 administration shut schools that have female students above class six.

On Wednesday females across Afghanistan had flocked to higher secondary schools as the date was set to re- open schools for girls of all ages by the Taliban government but hours into the first day, the ministry announced a reverse step.

The Ministry of Education has said that schools for girls would be closed until a plan was drawn up in accordance with Islamic law and Afghan culture, according to Bakhtar News Agency, a government news agency.

“We inform all girls of high schools and those schools that are having female students above class six that they are off until the next order,” said the notice.

On Friday, the United States of America cancelled planned talks with the Taliban in Qatar that were set to address key economic issues after the government decided to close schools till further notice.

Women protesters held banners that said “Education is our fundamental right, not a political plan”, as they marched for a short distance and later dispersed as Taliban fighters arrived at the scene, Al Jazeera reported.

The decision to shut schools on Wednesday came after a meeting late on Tuesday of senior officials in the southern city of Kandahar, the Taliban’s de facto power centre and ‘spiritual heartland.’

The US-led NATO forces withdrew from the country in August last year, 20 years after a military invasion toppled the Taliban armed group from power.

The Taliban’s six years in power (1996-2001) were marked by human rights violations and a ban on women’s education and jobs.

However, the group promised to protect women’s rights and press freedom in its first news conference following its stunning takeover of Afghanistan last year.

“We are going to allow women to work and study. We have got frameworks, of course. Women are going to be very active in the society but within the framework of Islam,” Zabihullah Mujahid, the group’s spokesman, had said at a news conference on August 16, 2021.