Kabul, March 10 (IANS) The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) on Monday highlighted that girls in Afghanistan have not been able to go to primary school for the third consecutive year and urged that no child should go to school hungry.
The call came ahead of the International School Meals Day on March 13.
“For three years now, girls in Afghanistan have only been able to go to primary school. It is also where they get the only nutritious food they eat all day. On International School Meals Day and every day, no child should go to school hungry,” World Food Programme in Afghanistan posted on X on Monday.
Afghanistan stands out as the only country in the world where secondary and higher education is strictly forbidden for girls and women. According to UNESCO data published in 2024, 1.4 million Afghan girls have been deliberately deprived of schooling. Access to primary education has also fallen sharply, with 1.1 million fewer girls and boys attending school.
According to a report of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), Afghanistan’s education system has been devastated by more than three decades of sustained conflict and for most of the country’s children, especially girls, completing primary school remains a distant dream, especially in rural areas.
Speaking at the ongoing 58th session of the Human Rights Council, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk stated that women in Afghanistan are currently being denied their basic fundamental rights.
“In Afghanistan, women and girls are subject to gender apartheid that is unparalleled in today’s world. Virtual prisoners within their homes, they are denied the most basic and fundamental freedoms essential to normal life, including movement, education and work. I am deeply concerned for the long-term future of a country that is self-harming on a national scale,” said Turk.
Hunger threatens one in three Afghans. Without immediate funding, millions of people will go without the food they need. One in three Afghan girls is unable to complete their primary education due to widespread poverty, according to a report released by the World Food Programme (WFP) in 2024.
Recently a UN-backed fund ‘Education Cannot Wait’ stated Taliban’s rule as a “dysfunctional regime” that not only denies girls the right to education but also prevents half the population from contributing to the country’s reconstruction.
“Today, 1.5 million Afghan girls are banned from attending secondary school because of restrictions imposed by the Taliban. Every year, this number increases by 300,000, and soon it will reach millions,” said Yasmine Sherif, Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait, a UN-backed global fund for education in emergencies.
–IANS
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