UNITED NATIONS, Sep 19 (APP):Marking one year since the Taliban decreed that girls should be excluded from high school, UN chief Antonio Guterres has urged the defacto rulers to \u201clet them back in\u201d without delay.<\/p>\n
In a strong personal appeal, the UN Secretary-General tweeted Sunday that the past 12 months represented \u201ca year of lost knowledge and opportunity that they will never get back\u201d.<\/p>\n
Echoing Guterrres\u2019s call, the UN Mission in Afghanistan repeated its demand for the ban to be overturned immediately.<\/p>\n
Markus Potzel, acting head of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), described the anniversary on Sunday as \u201ca tragic, shameful, and entirely avoidable\u201d development.<\/p>\n
The ongoing exclusion of girls from secondary school classes \u201chas no credible justification and has no parallel anywhere in the world,\u201d Potzel said.<\/p>\n
He added that the decision \u2013 taken soon after Taliban fighters rapidly overran Kabul last August – had been \u201cprofoundly damaging to a generation of girls and to the future of Afghanistan\u201d.<\/p>\n
When Afghanistan\u2019s high schools reopened to boys on 18 September last year, the newly installed Taliban rulers issued an order for girls aged 12 to 18, to remain at home, impacting grades seven to 12.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s estimated that more than one million girls have been barred from attending high school lessons over the past year, despite international condemnation and promises from the authorities that the situation would be remedied.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe UN yet again calls upon the Taliban to reverse the slew of measures they have introduced restricting Afghan women and girls\u2019 enjoyment of their basic rights and freedoms,\u201d said Potzel, who is also the UN Secretary-General\u2019s Deputy Special Representative for Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe window of opportunity may be narrowing, but we urge them to take concrete steps \u2013 such as actively enabling girls to return to high school \u2013 that can lift Afghanistan up and give hope to its people.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Afghan expert and veteran diplomat \u2013 who recently served as Ambassador of Germany to Afghanistan \u2013 insisted that the onus was on the Taliban \u201cto create favourable conditions for peace, inclusion, security, human rights and economic recovery\u201d.<\/p>\n
And he added that the international community \u201cremains ready\u201d to support a government represented \u201call its people and respects their rights\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
UNITED NATIONS, Sep 19 (APP):Marking one year since the Taliban decreed that girls should be excluded from high school, UN chief Antonio Guterres has urged the defacto rulers to \u201clet them back in\u201d without delay. In a strong personal appeal, the UN Secretary-General tweeted Sunday […]<\/p>\n
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