Malala Yousafzai urges Muslim leaders to back gender apartheid legal push

Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai urged Muslim leaders on Sunday to back efforts to make gender apartheid a crime under international law, and called on them to speak out against Afghanistan’s Taliban over its treatment of women and girls.

At a summit on girls’ education in Muslim communities attended by international leaders and scholars in her home country of Pakistan, Yousafzai said Muslim voices must lead the way against the policies of the Taliban, who have barred teenage girls from school and women from universities.

“In Afghanistan an entire generation of girls will be robbed of its future,” she said in a speech in Islamabad. “As Muslim leaders, now is the time to raise your voice, use your power.”

The Taliban say they respect women’s rights in accordance with their interpretation of Afghan culture and Islamic law. Taliban administration spokespeople did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Yousafzai’s statements.

No foreign government has formally recognised the Taliban since it took over Afghanistan in 2021 and diplomats have said steps towards recognition require a change of course on women’s rights.

Yousafzai survived being shot in the head when she was 15 in Pakistan by a gunman after campaigning against the Pakistani Taliban’s moves to deny girls an education.

The summit, organised by the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and the Muslim World League, included dozens of ministers and scholars from Muslim-majority countries.

Yousafzai asked the scholars to “openly challenge and denounce the Taliban’s oppressive laws” and for political leaders to support the addition of gender apartheid to crimes against humanity under international criminal law.

The summit was hosted by Pakistan, which has had frosty relations with the Afghan Taliban in recent months over accusations that militants are using Afghan soil to launch attacks on Pakistan, a charge the Taliban deny.