Pakistan hosted a two-day global conference Saturday, where delegates advocated for the promotion of girls’ education worldwide in Muslim communities and denounced restrictions on female schooling as contrary to the principles of Islam.
However, speakers, including the host, Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, and scholars from participating nations, refrained from mentioning Afghanistan, the sole Islamic country where its hard-line Taliban leaders have banned girls from seeking education beyond the sixth grade.
Pakistani officials announced on the eve of the conference that the Taliban government in Kabul had been formally invited to attend the Global Summit on Girls’ Education in Muslim Communities, but Islamabad did not receive a response.
More than 150 international dignitaries are attending the summit in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, including ministers, ambassadors, scholars, and academics from 44 Muslim and Muslim-friendly countries, as well as representatives from international organizations such as UNESCO, UNICEF, the World Bank, and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, according to officials.
Mohammad bin Abdulkarim Al-Issa, the secretary-general of the Muslim World League, a non-governmental international organization based in Saudi Arabia, stressed in his speech that men and women must acquire education. He later addressed a televised news conference with the help of his interpreter to emphasize that Islam allows women to receive an education.
“The Islamic world is united in its belief that those who oppose women’s education are misguided and do not represent true Islam,” Al-Issa responded when asked if the outcome of the summit could encourage the Taliban to relax restrictions on women’s access to education and employment in Afghanistan.
The Saudi scholar clarified that the gathering in Islamabad was not directed at any specific community or country.
“We have simply tried to address the concerns of those who oppose women’s education and conveyed our message that there are no restrictions in Islam regarding education for girls,” he stated, without naming Afghanistan.
The Taliban have refrained from commenting on their absence from the event. The de facto Afghan leaders vehemently resist criticism of their governance, asserting that their policies align with local culture and Islamic law, known as Sharia.
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai is also among the participants and is scheduled to address the gathering Sunday. She told reporters that she was happy to be returning to her native Pakistan.
“I am excited to join Muslim leaders from around the world for a critical conference on girls’ education,” Yousafzai said via social media platform X on the eve of the conference. “On Sunday, I will speak about protecting rights for all girls to go to school, and why leaders must hold the Taliban accountable for their crimes against Afghan women & girls,” she wrote.
In 2012, the education activist was shot and injured by the outlawed extremist Pakistani Taliban in her picturesque home district of Swat in northwestern Pakistan while she was a schoolgirl. She was subsequently airlifted to the United Kingdom for medical treatment and has since returned to her home country only a few times.
She has become a global advocate for girls’ education and, at 17, became the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.
The Pakistani Foreign Ministry announced that the conference will culminate in a formal signing of the Islamabad Declaration, committing Muslim nations to empowering girls through education to foster inclusive and sustainable educational reforms.
“We have decided to place [the] Islamabad Declaration to be signed by this conference before the United Nations, including the U.N. Security Council, as a collective aspiration of the Ummah (Muslim world),” Sharif said in his inaugural speech Saturday.
