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Turkiye President criticises Taliban ban on women education

January 13, 2023 at 7:06 pm

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a program in Ankara, Turkiye on January 10, 2023 [Mustafa Kamacı/Anadolu Agency]

Turkish President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, denounced the Taliban’s order to ban university and primary education for Afghanistan’s women as “un-Islamic”, local Turkish media reports.

“It is inhumane and un-Islamic,” Erdogan said while addressing an international conference on Ombudsmanship in Ankara.

“There is no such thing in our religion. No one should define any ban like that based on Islam. Islam does not accept such a thing. On the contrary, we are members of a religion that says ‘seek knowledge from the cradle to the grave’.”

According to the report, Turkiye hosted an extraordinary meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), which called on the Afghan interim government to review its ban on women’s education and working in educational and non-government organisations.

During meeting, the OIC decided to send a religious delegation to emphasise that women’s and girls’ access to all levels of education is a fundamental human right, the report added.

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