At the same time that the new solar year and the new academic year commence in Afghanistan, the United States Department of State expresses deep concern over the denial of education to Afghan girls, considering it “heartbreaking.”
Vedant Patel, Deputy Spokesperson for the US Department of State, said in a press briefing that if the Taliban government seeks international legitimacy, ensuring women’s rights is a crucial condition.
The spokesperson for the US Department of State added that this is the third year that Afghan girls and women have been deprived of education, and this issue is a priority in Washington’s policies regarding Afghanistan.
This comes as the Taliban held the first session of the new academic year in Kabul today, Wednesday. A session where there was no mention of girls’ education and even female journalists were not allowed to attend.
Habibullah Agha, the acting Minister of Education of the Taliban, said in this session that the only way to liberate from the need for outsiders is to “educate the children of the homeland in religious and modern sciences, and we are using all our resources to achieve this goal.”
In a statement released on the occasion of the new academic year, the ministry urged teachers and students of schools to “align their behavior and conduct with Islamic principles.”
The statement from this ministry reads: “We instruct all teachers and students to align their behavior and conduct with Islamic principles and refrain from wearing clothes that contradict Islamic principles and Afghan traditions.”
Abdul Salam Hanafi, the administrative deputy of the Prime Minister’s Office of the Taliban, also said in the ceremony marking the beginning of the academic year 1403 in Kabul that a nation without education will always depend on others, and a nation in need of others can never be independent.
He emphasized that more efforts should be made to provide modern and technological education alongside religious education for Afghan children.
According to Hanafi, 1.2 million new students have been enrolled in Afghan schools in the past solar year.
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