The minister of upper training within the Taliban authorities on Thursday defended his determination to ban ladies from universities — a decree that had triggered a worldwide backlash.
Discussing the matter for the primary time in public, Nida Mohammad Nadim stated the ban issued earlier this week was essential to forestall the blending of genders in universities and since he believes some topics being taught violated the rules of Islam. He stated the ban was in place till additional discover.
In an interview with Afghan tv, Mr Nadim pushed again in opposition to the widespread worldwide condemnation, together with from Muslim-majority international locations reminiscent of Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Qatar. Mr Nadim stated that foreigners ought to cease interfering in Afghanistan’s inside affairs.
Earlier on Thursday, the international ministers of the G7 group of states urged the Taliban to rescind the ban, warning that “gender persecution could quantity to against the law in opposition to humanity”.
The ministers warned after a digital assembly that “Taliban insurance policies designed to erase ladies from public life could have penalties for a way our international locations interact with the Taliban”. The G7 group consists of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK, the US and the European Union.
A former provincial governor, police chief and army commander, Mr Nadim was appointed minister in October by the supreme Taliban chief and beforehand pledged to stamp out secular education. Mr Nadim opposes feminine training, saying it’s in opposition to Islamic and Afghan values.
Different causes he gave for the college ban have been ladies’s failure to look at a gown code and the research of sure topics and programs.
“We instructed women to have correct hijab however they didn’t they usually wore clothes like they will a marriage ceremony,” he stated.
“Women have been learning agriculture and engineering, however this didn’t match Afghan tradition. Women ought to be taught, however not in areas that go in opposition to Islam and Afghan honour.”
He added that work was underneath strategy to repair these points and universities would reopen for girls as soon as they have been resolved. The Taliban made comparable guarantees about highschool entry for ladies, saying lessons would resume for them as soon as “technical points” round uniforms and transport have been sorted out, however women stay shut out of lecture rooms.
The Taliban tried to repair what he claimed have been issues they inherited from the earlier administration since their takeover final yr. He alleged that folks weren’t following guidelines and that this justified the college ban.
In Afghanistan, there was some home opposition to the college ban, together with from a number of cricketers. Cricket is a massively common sport within the nation, and gamers have a whole bunch of hundreds of followers on social media.
One other present of help for feminine college college students got here at Nangarhar Medical College. Native media reported that male college students walked out in solidarity and refused to take a seat for exams till ladies’s college entry was reinstated.
Regardless of initially promising a extra average rule respecting rights for girls and minorities, the Taliban have broadly applied their interpretation of Islamic legislation, or Sharia, since they seized energy in August 2021.
They’ve banned women from center faculty and highschool, barred ladies from most fields of employment and ordered them to put on head-to-toe clothes in public. Girls are additionally banned from parks and gymnasiums.
On the similar time, Afghan society, whereas largely conventional, has more and more embraced the training of women and girls over the previous 20 years.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, chatting with reporters in Washington on Thursday, echoed worldwide opposition to the Taliban determination to ban ladies from college research. He stated the Taliban won’t receive much-needed improved relations with the world in the event that they “proceed on this course”.
“What they’ve performed is to attempt to sentence Afghan ladies and women to a darkish future with out alternative,” he stated. “And the underside line is that no nation goes to have the ability to succeed, a lot much less thrive, if it denies half its inhabitants the chance to contribute. And to be clear, and we’re engaged with different international locations on this proper now. There’s going to be a price.”
Turkish Overseas Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu stated on Thursday that the ban was “neither Islamic nor humane”. Talking at a joint information convention together with his Yemeni counterpart, he referred to as on the Taliban to reverse their determination.
“What hurt is there in ladies’s training? What hurt does it do to Afghanistan?” Mr Cavusoglu stated. “Is there an Islamic rationalization? Quite the opposite, our faith, Islam, will not be in opposition to training, quite the opposite, it encourages training and science.”
Saudi Arabia, which till 2019 enforced sweeping restrictions on ladies’s journey, employment and different essential elements of their day by day lives, together with driving, additionally urged the Taliban to vary course.
The Saudi international ministry expressed “astonishment and remorse” at Afghan ladies being denied a college training. In an announcement late on Wednesday, the ministry stated the choice was “astonishing in all Islamic international locations”.
Beforehand, Qatar, which has engaged with the Taliban authorities, additionally condemned the choice.
Within the capital of Kabul, about two dozen ladies marched within the streets on Thursday, chanting in Dari for freedom and equality. “All or none. Don’t be afraid. We’re collectively,” they chanted.
In video obtained by The Related Press, one lady stated Taliban safety forces used violence to disperse the group.
“The women have been crushed and whipped,” she stated. “Additionally they introduced army ladies with them, whipping the women. We ran away, some women have been arrested. I don’t know what is going to occur.”
Women have been banned from faculty past the sixth grade for the reason that Taliban’s return.
In north-eastern Takhar province, teenage women stated the Taliban on Thursday pressured them out of a personal training coaching centre and instructed them they now not had the precise to check. One scholar, 15-year-old Zuhal, stated the women have been crushed.
One other, 19-year-old Maryam, stated whereas crying: “This coaching centre was our hope. What can these women do? They have been filled with hope and coming right here to be taught. It’s actually a pity. (The Taliban) have taken all our hopes. They closed faculties, universities, and the coaching centre, which was very small.”
