The United Nations Children\u2019s Fund (UNICEF), marking International Literacy Day, has warned that nine in 10 10-year-old children in Afghanistan do not have access to basic reading skills, a situation that, alongside continuing restrictions on education, has deepened concerns about the future of education in the country.<\/p>\n
Tajudeen Oyewale, UNICEF\u2019s representative in Afghanistan, wrote in a post on the social media platform X: \u201cNine out of 10 10-year-old children in Afghanistan are still struggling to acquire basic reading skills.\u201d He also stressed children\u2019s right to education and the need to invest in literacy in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
At the same time, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), marking International Literacy Day, described literacy as a fundamental human right for all and stressed the right of the people of Afghanistan to education and participation in society. The mission said that, despite progress, at least 739 million young people and adults around the world still lack basic literacy skills.<\/p>\n
UNAMA also called for a review of the state of literacy in Afghanistan, an examination of opportunities and challenges, and the use of past experience. The remarks come as, following the Taliban\u2019s return to power, about 2.2 million girls have been barred from attending school.<\/p>\n
UNESCO had previously warned that if these restrictions continue until 2030, the number of girls denied education in Afghanistan will rise to more than 4 million. The continuation of these restrictions has also been linked to consequences including child marriage and forced and early marriage.<\/p>\n
A UN representative had previously said that 50% of men and 80% of women in Afghanistan are illiterate. International Literacy Day has been observed every year on 8 September since 1967, with the aim of highlighting the importance of literacy in building a more just, peaceful and sustainable society.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
UNICEF says 90% of 10-year-olds in Afghanistan cannot read, as education restrictions deepen concerns over the country’s future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21365,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,8,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-important-news","category-social-affairs","category-top-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21366","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=21366"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21366\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21366"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21366"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}