Taliban Releases Afghan Activist Who Promoted Education for Girls

An Afghan activist who advocated for girls’ education has been liberated by the Taliban, according to a local NGO on Thursday. As per Pen Path, Matiullah Wesa was imprisoned for 215 days after his arrest seven months before.

Wesa has been vocal in his calls for females to have the freedom to attend school and has urged the Afghan government, which is run by the Taliban, to lift the prohibitions on female education.

The Taliban have prevented females from attending education beyond the sixth grade since seizing control of Afghanistan in August 2021. They outlawed women from attending colleges in December of last year. The only nation in the world that forbids women from attending school is Afghanistan.

Pen Path did not provide any more information on Wesa’s health or release. Richard Bennett, the UN special rapporteur on human rights in Afghanistan, expressed his happiness at Wesa’s news.

Bennett also demanded the “immediate and unconditional release of all Afghanistan human rights defenders who are arbitrarily detained for standing up for their own rights & the human rights of others” in a post on X, the platform that was once known as Twitter.

Wesa should never have been imprisoned for advocating for girls’ rights to an education, according to Amnesty International.

“Human rights advocates and female demonstrators Rasool Parsi, Neda Parwani, Zholia Parsi, and Manizha Sediqi, as well as everyone else who is unjustly imprisoned for advocating for equality and opposing repression, must be freed by the Taliban de-facto authorities,” the rights organization said on X.

Wesa and other members of Pen Path started a door-to-door campaign to encourage girls’ education before he was arrested.

Wesa said on social media, “We have been volunteering for 14 years to reach people and convey the message for girls’ education.” “We campaigned house-to-house for the past eighteen months to end all of our sufferings, including illiteracy.”

According to Wesa’s brother Attaullah, family members were beaten and Matiullah’s cell phone was taken by Taliban troops when they raided the family residence in late March.