The Taliban has stripped more rights from the country’s girls and women, with higher education now closed off to them indefinitely. Most secondary schools shut to girls soon after the Taliban took control last year. At universities, classrooms were gender segregated, with female students taught by female professors or older men. Just three months ago, thousands of Afghan girls and women sat their university entrance exams despite restrictions on subjects like veterinary science, engineering, economics and agriculture. Footage shows women crying as they were led away from campuses by Taliban guards, and a protest was quickly shut down. In response, many aid agencies have withdrawn support, and Western nations have made women’s access to education a condition of formal recognition of the Taliban as the nation’s government. The United Nations is “deeply concerned”, with a spokesperson saying, “A door closed to women’s education is a door closed to the future of Afghanistan”.