Taliban Arrests Afghan Singer from Panjshir in Kabul

According to OCHA, about 1.1 million female students in Afghanistan have been deprived of their right to education. Furthermore, more than 100,000 female students have been banned from attending universities across Afghanistan.

It has been more than 490 days since the Taliban banned girls from attending schools in Afghanistan.

After regaining control in August 2021, the Taliban imposed restrictions on Afghan women.

Human rights defenders have called the Taliban's anti-women policies "gender apartheid" in Afghanistan.

He added that such a government can reduce the threats caused by terrorist attacks, refugees, and drug trafficking in the region.

The Iranian foreign minister made these remarks on Tuesday at the meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers of the Economic Cooperation Organisation (ECO) in Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan.

Abdollahian added that Iran is one of the countries that played the main role in designing and approving the "ECO Support Policy for Afghanistan" and supports its implementation.

He said, "This support is in addition to bilateral aid to solve the problems of the people of Afghanistan and prevent humanitarian crises."

Afghanistan, Iran, Turkey, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan are members of the Economic Cooperation Organisation.

January 24 is celebrated as World Education Day, and on this occasion, diplomats and officials of international organisations have criticised the closure of schools and universities for Afghan women and girls.

For more than 490 days, the Taliban has prevented the reopening of girls' schools in Afghanistan.

On World Education Day, even Antonio Guterres, the United Nations Secretary General, called on the Taliban to reverse the ban on education for women.

Guterres said that now is the time to end all discriminatory practices that hinder access to education.

Similarly, the Charge d'Affaires of the US Embassy in Afghanistan, said that it is difficult to celebrate World Education Day while Afghan girls are deprived of the right to education.

The power outage in Uzbekistan over the recent weeks had caused Kabul and several provinces in Afghanistan to face electricity blackouts.

According to the Taliban, the technical problems in the production of electricity in Uzbekistan have been resolved and the country has announced its readiness to export 250 megawatts of electricity within the next 24 hours.

Earlier, the foreign minister of the Taliban had asked Uzbekistan not to cut off electricity exports to Afghanistan during difficult circumstances.

Most of Afghanistan's electricity is imported from Uzbekistan, Iran, Turkmenistan, and Tajikistan.

The Afghan scholars called for these measures in an open letter to the United Nations Secretary-General.

This letter states that Afghan “women should work and travel freely and girls should continue their studies in school and university”.

They also asked the United Nations to stop all direct and indirect support to the Taliban.

A part of the letter states, "They (Taliban) should be held responsible for their illegal actions and be subjected to more pressure and sanctions within the framework of international human rights laws.”

According to the letter, since taking over Afghanistan in August 2021, the Taliban have issued more than 30 decrees that target all aspects of Afghan women's lives.

The letter also states that the Taliban ignores almost all human rights standards and it is time to step up efforts to ensure accountability of the group for violations of international law.

The letter states that if the international community does not take further punitive measures, the Taliban's "repressive" actions might continue.