80 primary school girls poisoned, hospitalized in northern Afghanistan

Kabul: Fox News said an education official in Afghanistan said about 80 girls were hospitalized after being poisoned in schools. The incidents reportedly took place on Saturday and Sunday in Sar-e-Pul province in the north. Mohammad Rahmani, director of the provincial department of education, said that there was an incident of poisoning of girl students from class 1 to 6 in Sangcharak district.

He added that 60 children were poisoned at the Naswan-e-Qabad Ab School and 17 more at the Naswan-e-Faizabad School, Fox News reported. “Both the primary schools are close to each other and they are being targeted one after the other,” he said. “We shifted the students to the hospital and they are all fine now,” he added.

The department’s investigation is underway and initial inquiries suggest that someone paid a third party to carry out the attacks with malice, Rahmani said without sharing more details. He did not give any details about how the girls were poisoned or what kind of injuries they sustained, according to Fox News.

It is believed to be the first such attack since the Taliban came to power in August 2021 and began cracking down on the rights and freedoms of Afghan women and girls.

Fox News reports that girls are banned from further education beyond the sixth grade, including university, and women are banned from most jobs and public places. The attack was reminiscent of a wave of poisonings targeting school-age girls in neighboring Iran, back in November.

Thousands of students said they became ill from toxic fumes at these events. But there is no word about who may have been behind the incidents or what — if any — chemicals were used, Fox News reported.