Afghan women urge UN acknowledgement of their right to an education in the statement "Nothing Allowed For Them."

 Afghan women urge UN acknowledgement of their right to an education in the statement "Nothing Allowed For Them."

United Nations: After the Taliban administration retook control two years ago and forbade more than 1.1 million girls and women from attending colleges and universities, engineering student Somaya Faruqi was forced to leave Afghanistan in order to complete her education.

The 21-year-old, who now resides in the US, is the spokesperson for a campaign against the crisis that the UN's global fund Education Cannot Wait started on Tuesday to commemorate the two-year anniversary of the overthrow of the internationally recognised government in Kabul.  

The initiative is leading a global campaign to respect all Afghan girls' and women's right to education under the hashtag #AfghanGirlsVoices.

Numerous women and girls have already been forced to leave the nation in order to further their studies.

For instance, Faruqi completed her high school education in Qatar after leaving Afghanistan in 2021 with nine other members of her robotics team, "The Afghan Dreamers."

Thanks to a scholarship from Qatar, she is now starting her second year of engineering studies at Sacramento State University in California.

- 'Forgotten'

Faruqi told AFP over the phone that the goal of the campaign was to refocus global attention on the education problems facing Afghan females.

"Afghanistan seems to be forgotten," she continued.

One of the main issues blocking the international world from providing aid and official recognition to the Taliban regime is the nearly absolute exclusion of women from Afghan public life, particularly in school and work.

"The path to any more common relationship between the Taliban and foreign countries will be blocked unless and until the liberation of women and girls, among many other issues, have been truly supported," US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said to reporters in Washington.

According to a UN assessment released last month, the criteria for women and girls in Afghanistan are the "worst in the world." The Taliban government's regulations, which are based on its rigid interpretation of Islam, may amount to "gender apartheid."

According to the UN Special Envoy for Global Education, former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, the situation of rights for females in Afghanistan "should constitute as a crime against the human race, and it needs to be investigated by the International Criminal Court," he said to reporters during a video discussion on Tuesday.

- 'Tragic'

The Taliban regime forbade females from attending secondary school in 2021, just one month after retaking control for the first time in 20 years. In December 2022, it also closed the doors to universities to them, and in December 2022, it severely restricted their ability to participate in the labour.

These conditions, in Faruqi's opinion, are intolerable. Since education is the key to liberty, she told AFP, "we have for creating sure that (girls and women) receive having access to comparable opportunities and they get access to education."

"Girls have been banned from common spaces: schools, gyms, parks; there is absolutely nothing allowed for them to do; just to stay at home," she said in a Tuesday UN statement.

She told AFP that many families see marriage as the sole option for their girls' future, "regardless of their consent," and that many of her own classmates had been coerced into marriage.

"Depression is common. The previous two years have seen a significant increase in the suicide rate among females. She noted in the statement, "It is sad.

In the next month, the Education Cannot Wait campaign will use social media to spread awareness of the problem by elevating the voices of Afghan women and girls just as international leaders convene for the UN General Assembly on September 18 and 19.