Date: 02/01/1404

With the start of the new academic year in Afghanistan, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has issued a statement announcing that an additional 400,000 girls will be deprived of education this year. According to the statement, this brings the total number of girls excluded from schooling in Afghanistan to 2.2 million.Catherine Russell, UNICEF’s Executive Director, expressed deep concern as Afghanistan enters its fourth year of banning girls from education: “This decision continues to harm the future of millions of Afghan girls. If the ban remains in place until 2030, more than four million girls will be denied their right to education beyond the primary level.” She warned that the consequences of continued educational exclusion will be catastrophic for both Afghan girls and the country as a whole.

The scale and projected growth of girls’ exclusion from education in Afghanistan, as reported by UNICEF, demonstrates that the ban is not a temporary policy but a sustained, nationwide system of discrimination. The long-term social, economic, and governance impacts underscore the ban’s function as a structural tool of harm extending far beyond the education sector