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Afghan National Dialogue

Message from the Cologne National Dialogue Meeting to Afghanistan's Ruling Authorities on the Closure of Girls' Schoolsپیام نشست گفتمان ملی «مرکه ملی» در شهر کولن به مقامات حاکم کشورد افغانستان واکمنو چارواکو ته د نجونو د تړلو ښوونځيو په اړه

Date: 2025-07-19Location: Cologne, Germany

About the event

In this message, participants of the Cologne National Dialogue meeting — addressing the authorities as fellow Afghans, as fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, elders and youth — sincerely appealed for the doors of education to be reopened to Afghan girls, stressing that the request stems not from foreign pressure but from sacred Islamic values, the history of the Afghan people and the principles of human rights.

The message notes that education is a divine command, not a privilege: the first word of the Holy Quran was 'Iqra' (Read), and the Prophet (PBUH) declared the pursuit of knowledge obligatory for every Muslim, male and female; throughout Islamic history women have been scholars, writers and teachers, and the world's first university, al-Qarawiyyin, was founded by a Muslim woman, Fatima al-Fihri, in 859 CE.

It recalls that Afghan women have always been symbols of resolve, faith and honour — from the mother of Mirwais Nika and the mother of Ahmad Shah Baba to Malalai of Maiwand — and that today's Afghan girls, their heirs, seek no revolution but simply permission to serve their faith, homeland and people.

It asks who will be the doctors, teachers, engineers and scholars of tomorrow if girls remain barred from schools and universities, noting that women across the Islamic world study within Islamic frameworks, and asks why Afghanistan cannot build an Afghan-Islamic model in which both faith and knowledge are preserved.

The message concludes that the National Dialogue is neither a political opposition nor a source of discord but a popular effort to build solidarity, trust and solutions among Afghans, and it invites the authorities to hear this voice of the people — not a rebellion, not political pressure, not a foreign agenda, but a request to restore a divine, national and human right.