Afghanistan

University Completes Post-Taliban Term

Despite Spartan conditions on campus — there is no water or electricity, students must use outdoor toilets and walls are pocked with bullet holes — Kabul University recently concluded its first post-Taliban semester. Approximately 20 percent of the students enrolled for classes this year are women, who had been forbidden to attend under the Taliban regime.

English language was one of the most popular subjects offered, and it was standing-room only in many classrooms.

The university’s chancellor explained that most of the Islamic extremists who dominated the campus fled following the collapse of the Taliban government, while the rest have been driven underground.

The chancellor hopes extensive economic assistance from the United States and other Western countries can help rebuild the university and train the young professionals the country desperately needs. Twenty-three years of war have robbed the country of its best doctors, engineers and technicians, who left to work in Europe and America.