In yet another move by the Taliban to curb women right in Afghanistan, the group's new chancellor for Kabul University announced on Monday (Sept 27) that women would be indefinitely barred from the institution either as instructors or students.
"As long as a real Islamic environment is not provided for all, women will not be allowed to come to universities or work. Islam first," said the chancellor of Kabul University, Mohammad Ashraf Ghairat, on Twitter on Monday.
The new university policy echoes the Taliban's first time in power in the 1990s when women were only allowed in public if accompanied by a male relative and would be beaten for disobeying and were kept from school entirely.
"There is no hope, the entire higher education system is collapsing," said Mr Hamid Obaidi, a former spokesperson for the Ministry of Higher Education who was also a lecturer at the Journalism School of Kabul University. "Everything was ruined."
However, the Taliban's chief spokesperson, Mr Zabihullah Mujahid, tried to soften Mr Ghairat's announcement that women could not return to Kabul University, telling the Times, "It might be his own personal view."
