Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai called on Muslim leaders to reject and resist the Afghan Taliban’s restrictions on women and girls’ education.
“Do not legitimise them,” she urged while addressing delegates from Muslim-majority nations gathered to discuss advancing girls’ education in Pakistan’s capital Islamabad on Sunday.
Malala, a survivor of a 2012 attack by the Pakistani Taliban for advocating girls’ education, emphasised the importance of unified action from Muslim nations. “You can show true leadership,” the 27-year-old education activist told officials, pressing for a global stance against what she described as the Taliban’s crimes.
“Simply put, the Taliban do not see women as human beings,” said Yousafzai, condemning the Taliban’s suppression of Afghan women’s rights. “They cloak their crimes in cultural and religious justification.”
Despite being invited, Afghan Taliban representatives did not attend the conference. Pakistan education minister Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui confirmed the absence of a delegation from Kabul.
The conference, supported by the Muslim World League, marked a significant effort by Pakistan to address girls’ education across the Muslim world, where access remains a challenge.
Roza Otunbayeva, head of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), urged summit attendees to support Afghan girls through scholarships, online programs, and other education initiatives.
Since reclaiming power in 2021, the Taliban have imposed harsh restrictions on women and girls, including barring them from schools and universities, actions the United Nations labeled as “gender apartheid.”
Malala’s father, Ziauddin Yousafzai, also expressed his disappointment over the lack of decisive action from Muslim nations, stressing that more needs to be done to address the crisis in Afghanistan.