![]() Gul's experience is in line with those of many Afghan women, particularly in conservative rural areas, who are bound by the Islamic custom of mahram. ![]() Gul told RFE/RL's Radio Azadi that her husband's refusal to let her see a doctor contributed to the loss of two of her newborn children. ![]() "There are only men at the hospital there are no female doctors." "Why would a woman need to go to the hospital?" 31-year-old Zia Gul, a resident of the northern Parwan Province, recalled her husband saying during her difficult pregnancies. Giving birth is a life or death struggle for women in Afghanistan, where roughly one mother is believed to die every two hours from preventable pregnancy and childbirth complications.Įven mothers who survive face the stark reality that their newborns may not, with the Taliban's Health Ministry estimating 22 children die for every 1,000 live births. He told the BBC that some courses were closed to women because there was a lack of interest.įew women have accepted that explanation. Khamush, the Taliban official, said they were not allowing women to apply for certain courses because they could not arrange separate classes for men and women in some universities. This year, the militants offered an exemption for girls in the last year of school. The number of women taking the university entrance exams is expected to fall dramatically next year if the Taliban maintains its ban on education for teenage girls. But teachers and students have said that in some provinces the number of women who took the exams this year dropped by as much as 90 percent compared to 2021.Īround 180,000 students took the exams last year, which were held just before the Taliban seized power in August. RFE/RL was unable to verify the figures provided by the Taliban. "I was heartbroken and disillusioned, so I walked away," Fatima, whose full name has not been disclosed to protect her identity, told RFE/RL's Radio Azadi.Īfghan women attend the inauguration of a women's library in Kabul in August.Ībdul Qadir Khamush, the head of the examinations division in the Taliban's Higher Education Ministry, told Radio Azadi that 150,000 students took the university entrance exams between October 13-15, with 35 percent of them women. ![]() But when she was told that she could not study journalism, she left the exam. Others who participated were in the final year of school when the militants banned secondary-school education for girls.įatima, a 20-year-old from the northern province of Parwan, had long dreamed of becoming a reporter. Some of the girls and women allowed to take the exams had graduated from school just before the Taliban takeover. They have also imposed strict gender segregation in universities. The militants have banned girls above the sixth grade from attending school. It is the latest restriction on female education in Afghanistan since the Taliban seized power in August 2021. The move has limited the career prospects of many women and forced some to give up on their dreams. The Taliban allowed thousands of Afghan girls and women to take university entrance exams last week.īut the militant group has banned them from applying for many courses, including journalism, engineering, economics, and many social and natural sciences. ![]()
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