Armed guards stop Afghan women entering universities after Taliban ban

Kabul, Afghanistan (AFP):

Hundreds of young women were stopped by armed guards on Wednesday from entering Afghan university campuses, a day after the nation’s Taliban rulers banned them from higher education.

Despite promising a softer rule when they seized power last year, the Taliban have ratcheted up restrictions on women’s lives, ignoring international outrage.

A team of AFP journalists saw groups of students gathered outside universities in Kabul, barred from entering by armed guards and shuttered gates.

“The Taliban are scared of women’s progress. We can raise educated children in society and they are scared of that,” said 19-year Wajiha Kazimi, who survived an attack on an education centre in the capital earlier this year.

The Taliban authorities wanted to “suppress” women, said Setara Farahmand, 21, who was studying German literature at Kabul University.

“They only want women to stay at home and give birth to children. That’s it, they don’t want anything more for them.”

Male students also expressed shock at the latest edict, with some in the eastern city of Jalalabad boycotting their exams in protest.

“It really expresses their illiteracy and low knowledge of Islam and human rights,” said one male university student, asking not to be named.

At least two male university lecturers in Kabul announced they were quitting in protest.

Most private and government universities are closed for a few weeks over winter, although campuses generally remain open to students and staff.

“We are doomed. We have lost everything,” said one Kabul student, who asked not to be identified.

Consequences

The decision to bar women from universities came late Tuesday in a terse announcement from Neda Mohammad Nadeem, the minister for higher education.

“You all are informed to immediately implement the mentioned order of suspending education of females until further notice,” he said.

On Wednesday, the foreign ministers from a host of governments including all Group of Seven members, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Switzerland and the European Union warned the move would have “consequences for how our countries engage with the Taliban”.

The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) said the ban was “seriously denting the credibility of the government”.

Muslim nation Qatar — which has played a key role in facilitating talks between the West and the Taliban — said everyone deserves the right to education and urged Afghanistan’s rulers to review the decision “in line” with Islamic teachings.

The decision comes less than three months after thousands of girls and women were allowed to sit for university entrance exams across the country.

“Just think of all the female doctors, lawyers and teachers who have been, and who will be, lost to the development of the country,” said UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk in a statement.

After the Taliban takeover in August last year, universities were forced to implement new rules including gender-segregated classrooms and entrances, while women were only permitted to be taught by professors of the same sex, or old men.

The international community has made the right to education for all women a sticking point in negotiations over aid and recognition of the Taliban regime.

Afghanistan’s neighbour Pakistan said that engagement with the Taliban was still the best path forward, though Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari admitted Tuesday while on a visit to Washington that he was disappointed.

“I still think the easiest path to our goal — despite having a lot of setbacks when it comes to women’s education and other things — is through Kabul and through the interim government,” he said.