Pak Foreign Minister, US Special Representative Discuss Engagement with Taliban

A senior Taliban official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told Afghanistan International that the group's new education minister has not even received basic education. The high-ranking Taliban official added, "The appointment [of Habibullah Agha] is a setback for some Taliban leaders who have made little efforts to reopen girls' secondary schools."

The Taliban on Wednesday announced a list of Cabinet and senior government appointments by Hibatullah Akhundzada, the leader of this group.

According to the decree, Mawlawi Habibullah Agha, the head of the provincial ulema council of Kandahar, has been appointed as the acting minister of education of the Taliban.

Nurullah Monib, who was the Taliban's Minister of Education, has now been appointed as the head of the Taliban's Dar al-Afta.

After the takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban on August 15, 2021, the group ordered closure of secondary schools for girls across Afghanistan.

The head of the Afghan Girls Robotics Team stressed that there is no prospect for reopening of schools for girls in Afghanistan.

She said that girls in Afghanistan are facing an uncertain future and added, "The Taliban will completely remove our existence from society. Thousands of more girls may never be able to go back to school. Many of them are already married."

Addressing world leaders, she said that if these leaders think that Afghan girls deserve education, they should not let her and other girls become "victims of international policies".

In late 2021, when the Taliban took control of Afghanistan, they prevented Afghan girls from returning to high schools across Afghanistan.

Noorullah Munir, the Acting Minister of Education of the group, however, recently claimed that Afghans don’t want to educate their girls when they turn 16.

According to reports, at least 10 cafes in the PD 18 have been sealed.

During the past several years, cafes have become the main hub for youth in Kabul and other major Afghan cities to connect.

In many cases, cultural programmes, book review sessions, and book readings have been held at these cafes.

With the takeover of power by the Taliban in August 2021, many cultural centers, cafes, and small businesses ceased to operate in Kabul and other cities across Afghanistan.

These Afghan women protested against the killing of Mehsa Amini, an Iranian woman who had died, after being tortured by the morality police in Iran.

A statement published on social media in support of Iranian women includes a list of Afghan female activists.

The statement stressed that Afghan women’s suffering isn’t different from the suffering of thousands of other Iranian women who have always fought against one of the leaders of the Islamic republic and have been repressed in the most severe ways possible.

These women have said that with the slogan, "death to the Taliban, whether in Kabul or in Tehran", they declared their solidarity with the women of Iran.

The UN office stressed that the Taliban’s investigation of the cold-blood killings must be transparent in order to be taken seriously and said that UNAMA continues to track Panjshir developments.

UNAMA confirmed the credibility of the killings in Panjshir a week after the Taliban published video clips of the cold-blood killing of the National Resistance Front Forces detained by the group in Panjshir.

In one of these videos, a picture of a Panjshiri father and son had also been published, who was first captured and then shot dead by the Taliban.

At the same time, Zabihullah Mujahid, the spokesperson of the Taliban, had announced that the group had killed around 40 members and arrested over 100 fighters of the National Resistance Front.