'My heart is bleeding': Afghan women devastated by university ban

[niyad]

‘My heart is bleeding’: Afghan women devastated by university ban

(a wet dream for the christofascist talibangelicals in this country!)

The Taliban’s decision to suspend women from accessing higher education has extinguished a rare source of hope for many.
By Ruchi Kumar
Published On 21 Dec 202221 Dec 2022

Maryam, a 23-year-old political science student in Afghanistan, was finishing her university assignments on Tuesday evening, when her fiancé called to say that the Taliban had banned all women from universities. “He told me, ‘I am very sorry, you will not be able to take your final exams; universities have closed for you.’ My heart has been bleeding since I heard those words,” she told Al Jazeera, choking back tears.


On Tuesday, the Taliban told all public and private universities to “[suspend] education of girls until further notice”, according to a statement issued by the Taliban’s Minister of Higher Education Nida Mohammad Nadim said.The Taliban did not give a reason for the ban. The Ministry of Higher Education did not respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment. The gates of several prominent universities were blocked by Taliban vehicles on Wednesday morning in an attempt to prevent women from entering campuses, several students told Al Jazeera.

. . . . .

Maryam, whose full name has been withheld to protect her identity, had spent the last two hours prior to the ban preparing for her exams scheduled in the coming days. She is in the last semester of a political science degree and had been determined to complete it despite the grim circumstances in the country. “Every day I go to work, and then attend classes in the evenings, and study till late in the night, so I can achieve my dreams and serve my country,” she said. “I have to send an essay to another university for a master’s scholarship. But my arms and legs are numb. I can’t write the words. I want to cry, but I can’t cry. I feel like I have been punished for having hopes and dreams,” she added.

. . . . .

International agencies and governments have spoken out strongly against the ban. “The world must reject, as Afghans have, that this is about culture or religion,” US Special Envoy Rina Amiri wrote on Twitter. “In Afghan history, only the Taliban have enacted policies forbidding girls’ education. In no Muslim-majority country, in no place in the world, are girls denied an education,” she pointed out, urging the global community to take action against Taliban policies.

. . . . .

“They have to answer to the women of Afghanistan why they are doing this to us.”


https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/12/21/afghan-women-devastated-by-taliban-university-ban