The UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, has drawn attention to the alarming number of girls worldwide who are deprived of education, with over half of them living in conflict-affected countries.
Guterres took to Twitter on Saturday to express his concern stating, “Nearly 130 million girls are out of school globally – putting them at a risk of early marriage, violence, and exploitation.”
“Investing in girls, their education, and human rights, is investing in our future,” he further added.
While the reasons for girls’ education deprivation are varied and complex globally, in Afghanistan, the Taliban has implemented a ban on girls’ education beyond the sixth grade.
UNESCO has underscored the severity of the situation in the country, revealing that since September 2021, the return to school for Afghan girls aged 12 and above has been indefinitely postponed, leaving 1.1 million girls and young women without access to formal education. Startlingly, according to UNESCO’s statistics, nearly 30% of girls in Afghanistan have never had the opportunity to enter primary education.
