A top Taliban official has called on the group’s senior leadership to reverse its policy of banning education for Afghan girls, highlighting the growing discontent within their ranks over this controversial stance. Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanekzai, the acting deputy foreign minister and former lead negotiator in Doha, stated over the weekend that denying education to girls is against Islamic Sharia law and harms half of Afghanistan’s population.
Stanekzai Stands Strong Against Banning Education for Afghan Girls
“Please let the heads of the Islamic Emirate open the schools for the children,” Stanekzai said, speaking about the Taliban’s self-proclaimed administration. Speaking to Tolo News, he added,
“In the era of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), knowledge doors were opened to both men and women at that time.”
Stanekzai criticized the current constraints, which he maintained unfairly impact Afghanistan’s 20 million women and girls, out of a total population of 40 million. His statements are arguably some of the most militant criticisms of the policy by a Taliban figure, which has elicited strong international condemnation and fueled the group’s diplomatic pariah status.
Education Ban Widens Isolation
The Taliban’s sudden reversal (2022) of their earlier commitment to restoring education for girls in secondary schools has been a major barrier to escaping the sanctions. Universities were also closed to female students at the end of the same year. Although the Taliban claims that these restrictions are under their definition of Islamic law, various Islamic scholars, even Stanekzai, have vehemently denounced these limitations.
Stanekzai’s statements underline internal divisions within the Taliban, as sources suggest the policies were driven by the group’s supreme spiritual leader, Haibatullah Akhundzada, based in Kandahar.
Western officialdom and human rights agencies have time and again made clear that the Taliban’s view of women’s learning impedes every step to formal international recognition. In fact, the team has yet to provide an unambiguous schedule or program for reopening schools and universities to girls.
When asked about Stanekzai’s comments, no comment was responded to from a spokesperson for the Taliban militant group in Kandahar.