Schoolgirls attend class in Herat, Afghanistan on August 17, 2021, not long after the Taliban's takeover of the country. Aref Karimi/ AFP/ File photo
Months later on March 23, the education ministry opened secondary schools for girls, but within hours the Taliban leadership ordered classes to be shut again. "It is profoundly damaging to a generation of girls and to the future of Afghanistan itself," he said, adding the ban had no parallel in the world."A year of lost knowledge and opportunity that they will never get back," Guterres said on Twitter.Several Taliban officials say the ban is only temporary, but they have also wheeled out a litany of excuses for the closures—from a lack of funds to time needed to remodel the syllabus along Islamic lines.