What to do about the Taliban's gender apartheid

For three years now, since the Taliban’s return to power, girls in Afghanistan have been unable to attend secondary school. They are in desperate need of a basic education, yet their rights have been systematically curtailed under the Taliban’s regime of “gender apartheid”.

Although a recent United Nations meeting in Qatar did manage to bring the Taliban to the table, girls’ rights were not on the agenda. The Taliban insist that they will not accept international advice on the issue. In a blatant violation of international law (and in contempt of our shared humanity), the Taliban have cast aside the UN Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

The only proper response to this abuse is to continue demanding that the Taliban heed the international community’s concerns. Even if the regime will not listen to the UN, which has condemned its violations, it may respond to pressure from fellow Muslims, many of whom warn that refusing to develop the potential of half the population is jeopardising Afghanistan’s future.

Afghan girls dream of becoming doctors, nurses, teachers, engineers, entrepreneurs, and more. They want to play their part in rebuilding a strong, financially viable, and independent Afghanistan. There is no good reason for them to be denied that opportunity. Moreover, Taliban education policy is not just hurting women and girls. According to Human Rights Watch, there has been a significant decline in the quality of boys’ education across eight of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces.

One tragic result of girls’ exclusion from education has been a rise in forced marriage. A recent UN Women report documents a 25% increase in the rate of child marriage, citing the education ban as a key factor.

In other cases, the systematic violations of girls’ rights are matters of life and death. Mental distress, depression, and suicide attempts are rising, and the risk of maternal mortality – young girls dying in childbirth – appears to have increased by at least 50%. With evidence from around the world showing that schooling for young women can reduce child mortality (under age five) by as much as half, we must now brace for a rise in infant deaths.

Nor is this abuse confined to children. The Taliban have also issued bans on female teachers and on women working in the civil service and in universities, and squeezed Afghan civil society. Following its “suspension” of women’s right to work with national and international NGOs, it has become impossible for many such organisations to continue to operate and provide basic services in the country.

Afghanistan’s future depends on reversing these bans. For each year of additional schooling a country provides its children, it can expect up to an 18% return in GDP per capita. For every $1 spent on girls’ education, Afghanistan would generate $2.80 in future income. But if women cannot join the workforce, Afghanistan will never recover from its decades of wars and extreme poverty. Around half of the population will remain in need of humanitarian assistance.

Courageous Afghan girls, with support from Education Cannot Wait’s groundbreaking #AfghanGirlsVoices campaign, are stepping up to demand an end to the Taliban’s gender apartheid. Underground schools, local homeschooling, and remote learning can all help. In 2023, Education Cannot Wait’s investments in Afghanistan reached nearly 200,000 girls and boys through community-based education programs.

But despite the overwhelming demand from girls, our partners on the ground are struggling against clerical resistance, especially in Taliban strongholds like Helmand and Kandahar. These authorities need to be told that Afghanistan will not receive financing for education until full access for girls is restored.

In the meantime, we can do more to reach Afghan girls by expanding the online and radio courses on offer from the rest of the world. That means recruiting more universities and schools to offer online courses and make their curriculums available.

There are also other ways to pressure the Taliban leadership. We know that not all Taliban agree with the current discrimination against their daughters, sisters, and wives. Other countries can increase the pressure on the regime through their own domestic legal frameworks, such as by sanctioning the Taliban leaders who are most resistant to girls’ rights.

Predominantly Muslim countries have an especially important role to play. Qatar’s foreign ministry – which has long served as a mediator between the Taliban and the West – has pushed for an end to the bans; the Saudis have criticised the Taliban for failing to give “Afghan women their full legitimate rights, foremost of which is the right to education, which contributes to supporting security, stability, development, and prosperity in Afghanistan”; and the United Arab Emirates has decried the policy as a violation of “the teachings of Islam, and must be swiftly reversed.”

Islamic teaching does indeed support the education of girls – “Iqra,” meaning to read, is the first word of the Quran – and the rest of the Muslim world promotes it. “The seeking of knowledge is obligatory for every Muslim,” states Al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 74, one of the six canonical teachings in Sunni Islam, which emphasises the faith’s deep commitment to learning – by men and women.

Afghan girls must not be excluded from this commitment. They, and advocates of girls’ rights everywhere, need to know that this is a battle that can still be won.

Gordon Brown, a former prime minister of the United Kingdom, is United Nations Special Envoy for Global Education and Chair of Education Cannot Wait.

This piece was first published on www.project-syndicate.org

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