(BrightPress.org) – Nearly 80 elementary school girls were injured in a poisoning attack in northern Afghanistan according to an education official in the area. This attack is the first of its kind since the Taliban took control of the country in August 2021, which is known for its repressive ideology when it comes to women. Under Taliban rule and their strict religious ideology, women are barred from most employment opportunities and public spaces, and girls are not allowed to be educated beyond 6th grade.
The official explained that the perpetrator had a “personal grudge” without further elaboration. He also said that two schools that were attacked are in close proximity and that the attacker had paid for the help of a third party to engineer the incidents. There were no fatalities and the girls who were injured were hospitalized and recovering, details on how they were injured or what the precise nature of the attack were weren’t available.
In neighboring Iran, there has been a wave of poisonings impacting girls’ and women’s educational facilities. Upwards of thousands of girls have been poisoned by noxious fumes in a series of attacks that began last November. There have been no arrests in those attacks leading the UN to condemn the Islamic State for its failure to protect women and girls in their jurisdiction.
Some Iranian parents removed their girls from schools over the fear of the incidents continuing. Iran doesn’t seem to be taking the issue seriously as Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi attributed the incidents to “stress” in as many as 90% of the cases. He did not elaborate on the other 10%, however. Their state-affiliated media has similarly dismissed the crimes as an attempt by students to avoid their exams.
Iran is a hotbed of misogyny with the state routinely criminalizing women’s dress if it doesn’t precisely fit with the dictates of radical Islam. Mahsa Amini died mysteriously while under arrest in Iran for wearing trousers that were “too tight” on a recent trip to Tehran. Her suspicious death was widely protested, and reporters who covered it are still in jail for the crime of covering the story.
When analyzing stories like these, it truly drives home what a danger these extreme ideologies are to women and girls everywhere.
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