Five years after the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan, 2.4 million girls remain locked out of secondary school. Afghanistan is now the only country in the world that formally prohibits girls and women from receiving an education beyond the primary level, according to UNESCO.
The United Nations agency issued a new call Tuesday for the immediate and unconditional restoration of girls' right to education. According to a report by Fox News, UNESCO also warned that the consequences of the Taliban's policies now reach far beyond the classroom, with women barred from most paid jobs and public-facing professions and facing restrictions on their ability to travel without a male guardian.
"Women have been erased from public life, and as a new generation of girls grows without an education, their future becomes increasingly dark," UNESCO said in a statement.
The Taliban swept back into power on Aug. 15, 2021, as U.S. and NATO forces withdrew from Afghanistan after two decades of war. The group soon barred girls from secondary schools and later expanded the restrictions to universities, employment, and other areas of public life. Despite years of pressure from the United Nations, humanitarian groups, human rights advocates, and several Islamic countries, the Taliban has refused to lift the education restrictions and has maintained that the issue is a domestic matter, according to The Associated Press.
The reversal has been dramatic. While girls had severely limited access to schooling in 2001, nearly 1 million were enrolled in secondary education by 2021, according to UNESCO. Five years later, an estimated 2.4 million girls are excluded from secondary education.
"Five years is not a temporary interruption in a child's education," said Hoda Jaberian, UNESCO's program coordinator for education in emergencies, during a video news conference Tuesday. "It is clearly almost an entire secondary school cycle."
UNESCO warned that denying education to girls while restricting women's ability to work could deepen Afghanistan's already severe economic problems. Nearly half of Afghanistan's population lives below the poverty line. The agency said preventing women from studying and working limits their ability to support families and contribute to the national economy.
The effects could extend to Afghan boys as well. UNESCO said the Taliban's ban on female teachers teaching boys is worsening teacher shortages and undermining the quality of education across the country. The agency also warned that excluding girls from school can damage their mental and physical well-being and increase the risk of early marriage.
