Taliban 'afraid of educated girls' says Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai has lashed out at the Taliban for backtracking on their promise to allow girls to get an education.

Yousafzai, who is a known advocate for girls' education, said that it was a "devastating day" when girls were sent back from schools earlier this week.

Yousafzai was shot in the head after her school bus was ambushed by the Taliban in 2012, sparking international outrage. The local Taliban had banned girls from attending school in her native Swat Valley in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

"I had one hope for today: that Afghan girls walking to school would not be sent back home. But the Taliban did not keep their promise," she wrote in a Twitter post.

"They will keep finding excuses to stop girls from learning – because they are afraid of educated girls and empowered women," she added.

The Taliban backtracked on its decision to open schools for girls beyond 6th grade, just hours before the schools were set to open for the first time since August last year.

The move came at the start of the new school year in Afghanistan on Wednesday. The group had previously promised to "protect" the rights of women and had said that women would be allowed to get an education.

In an interview with BBC, Malala Yousafzai said that what the Taliban has done did not come as a shock as they have done similar things in the past.

"It is such a devastating day, for them, for us, because the Taliban made a promise that they'll allow girls to go to schools," she said.

"We know that the Taliban will continue to make excuses to prevent girls from learning, we are not unfamiliar with that," she further stated.

"We have heard it in the past, we heard it back in 1996, we heard it in the Swat Valley as well and we hear it even today in 2022, that they will prevent girls from their education, they will use the excuse of uniform, walking to school, separation and segregated classrooms and female teachers," Yousafzai added.

The last-minute announcement to not open schools for women triggered global backlash for the Taliban regime with leaders from across the world condemning the move.