The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has warned that, nearly five years after restrictions were imposed on education in Afghanistan, around 2.4 million girls in the country will be deprived of secondary education by 2026 \u2014 a situation the agency says will have far-reaching social and economic consequences for Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
In a statement released yesterday, August 20, UNESCO described Afghanistan as the only country in the world where access for girls and women to education beyond the primary level is officially banned. The agency said the continued restrictions have reversed two decades of gains in girls\u2019 education.<\/p>\n
According to UNESCO, while access to education for girls was severely limited in 2001, by 2021 nearly one million girls were enrolled in middle and high schools. The agency said depriving women and girls of education is a serious violation of their fundamental right to learn and warned that the persistence of this situation could damage Afghanistan\u2019s human potential for decades.<\/p>\n
UNESCO added that the restrictions continue at a time when nearly half of Afghanistan\u2019s population lives below the poverty line. According to the organization, deprivation of education and limits on women\u2019s employment reduce their ability to support their families and contribute to the country\u2019s economic future.<\/p>\n
The agency also said the education restrictions have a negative impact on the mental and physical health of women and girls and increase the risk of early marriage. UNESCO added that the Taliban administration\u2019s decision to prevent female teachers from teaching male students has also worsened the teacher shortage and made the quality of education vulnerable for all.<\/p>\n
UNESCO said it is continuing community-based education, literacy, skills development and psychosocial support programmes in Afghanistan to create alternative learning pathways. According to the organization, nearly 70,000 people have benefited from these programmes so far, 73% of them women.<\/p>\n
However, UNESCO stressed that these programmes cannot replace formal education and once again called on the Taliban administration to restore women\u2019s and girls\u2019 right to education immediately and without conditions. The Taliban administration has not yet responded on this issue, but previously said education and schooling would be provided for all when conditions allow.<\/p>\n
UNESCO is one of the United Nations\u2019 specialized agencies in education, science and culture, and in recent years has repeatedly warned about the consequences of education restrictions in Afghanistan. After the Taliban returned to power in 2021, education for girls above the sixth grade was suspended in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
UNESCO warns 2.4 million girls in Afghanistan could be denied secondary education by 2026 under Taliban restrictions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":19589,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19590","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-important-news","category-social-affairs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19590","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19590"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19590\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19589"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19590"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19590"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19590"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}