The Taliban's higher education ministry has ordered an indefinite ban on university education for women in Afghanistan in the latest edict cracking down on women's rights and freedoms, drawing strong international condemnation.
The announcement came as the United Nations Security Council met in New York, and the US state department announced the release of two Americans detained by the Taliban.
Despite initially promising a more moderate rule respecting rights for women and minorities, the Taliban have widely implemented their strict interpretation of Islamic law since seizing control of the country last year.
They banned girls from middle school and high school, restricted women from most employment and ordered them to wear head-to-toe clothing in public.
Women were also banned from parks and gyms and prevented from travelling without a male relative.
A letter, confirmed by a spokesperson for the higher education ministry, instructed Afghan public and private universities to suspend access to female students immediately, in accordance with a Cabinet decision.
Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen said while he had not yet confirmed the details behind the decision to exclude women from study, he believed it would be temporary.
"Education is the legitimate demand of our people and needs a solution. It could never be a permanent decision," he told the ABC.
The ban on higher education comes weeks after Afghan girls sat university entrance exams across the country, despite being blocked from year 12 classrooms.
Until now, some women had been allowed to continue their university studies but in gender-segregated classrooms.
"I can't fulfil my dreams, my hopes. Everything is disappearing before my eyes and I can't do anything about it," said a third-year journalism and communication student at Nangarhar University. She did not want to be identified for fear of reprisals.
"Is being a girl a crime? If that's the case, I wish I wasn't a girl," she added.
"My father had dreams for me, that his daughter would become a talented journalist in the future. That is now destroyed. So, you tell me, how will a person feel in this situation?"
Human Rights Watch called the move "a shameful decision" that makes clear the Taliban's lack of respect for "the fundamental rights of Afghans".
Foreign governments, including the United States, have said that a change in policies on women's education is needed before it can consider formally recognising the Taliban-run administration, which is also subject to heavy sanctions.
"The Taliban cannot expect to be a legitimate member of the international community until they respect the rights of all Afghans, especially the human rights and fundamental freedom of women and girls," US Deputy UN Ambassador Robert Wood told the council, describing the move as "absolutely indefensible".
Britain's UN Ambassador Barbara Woodward said the suspension was "another egregious curtailment of women's rights and a deep and profound disappointment for every single female student".
"It is also another step by the Taliban away from a self-reliant and prosperous Afghanistan," she told the council.
Broken promises on female education
In March, the Taliban drew criticism from many foreign governments and some Afghans for making a U-turn on signals all girls' high schools would be opened.
UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the move on Tuesday was "clearly another broken promise from the Taliban".
"It's another very troubling move and it's difficult to imagine how the country can develop, deal with all of the challenges that it has, without active participation of women and the education of women," he said.
Shortly before the announcement on universities, UN special envoy for Afghanistan Roza Otunbayeva said the closure of high schools had "undermined" the Taliban administration's relationship with the international community and was "extremely unpopular among Afghans and even within the Taliban leadership".
"As long as girls remain excluded from school and the de facto authorities continue to disregard other stated concerns of the international community, we remain at something of an impasse," she said.
One mother of a university student, who asked not to be named for security reasons, said her daughter called her in tears when she heard of the letter, fearing she could no longer continue her medical studies in Kabul.
"The pain that not only I … and (other) mothers have in our heart, could not be described," she said.
"We are all feeling this pain."
US State Department spokesperson Ned Price told reporters that the US will look to see what more it can do to hold the Taliban to account.
"This unacceptable stance will have significant consequences for the Taliban and will further alienate the Taliban from the international community," he said.
The Taliban were ousted in 2001 by a US-led coalition for harbouring al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and returned to power after America’s chaotic departure last year.
The Taliban say they respect women's rights in accordance with their interpretation of Islamic law.
Taliban released two detained Americans
The Taliban released two American nationals held in Afghanistan on Tuesday in what appears to be a "goodwill gesture", Mr Price said, adding that they will soon be reunited with their loved ones.
Speaking at a daily press briefing, Mr Price said Washington was continuing to raise with the Taliban the need to release any US nationals detained in Afghanistan but declined to provide who they may be and how many people may be held there.
The release was not part of any larger prisoner swap, and no money changed hands, he told reporters.
"We are providing these two US nationals with all appropriate assistance. They will soon be reunited with their loved ones and we are absolutely gratified to see that," Mr Price said.
"We understand this, or at least the Taliban characterised this to us, as a goodwill gesture."
The pair was released three months after the Taliban freed Mark Frerichs, an American engineer, in an exchange for Bashir Noorzai, a convicted drug smuggler held by the United States since 2005 and granted clemency by US President Joe Biden.
A new report released on Wednesday by Save the Children listed Afghanistan as the worst country in the world to be a child with an estimated 14 million children in need of aid.
The report said children were suffering from poverty, hunger, "political neglect and lack of funding for humanitarian responses".
Chris Nyamandi, Country Director of Save the Children Afghanistan, said millions of children were at risk of severe malnutrition and life-threatening illnesses.
"It's a humanitarian catastrophe on a scale the country has never seen before, and it's only set to get worse," he said.
"Families are taking desperate measures to survive — sending their children to work or surviving on bread alone."
The US does not formally recognise Afghanistan's ruling Taliban, who took power from the government after US forces withdrew in August 2021.
Despite sanctions by the United Nations and member states, the UN Security Council adopted an exemption last year to allow the UN and aid groups to deal with sanctioned Taliban leaders to meet humanitarian needs.
However, UN aid chief Martin Griffiths told the Security Council that while this move had "helped save lives", it was not enough.
Mr Griffiths said 97 per cent of Afghans live in poverty, two-thirds of the population need humanitarian aid to survive, 20 million people face acute hunger and 1.1 million teenage girls remain banned from school.
ABC/wires
