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Laura Bush in Afghanistan to back women's education
30 Mar 2005 21:26:19 GMT
Source: Reuters
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(Adds fresh quotes 16, 17) By Tabassum Zakaria and Simon Cameron-Moore KABUL, March 30, (Reuters) - U.S. first lady Laura Bush visited Afghanistan for the first time on Wednesday to promote education for women, which was forbidden by the Taliban government overthrown by U.S.-led forces three years ago. Shortly before Bush landed in Kabul, a car bomb attack claimed by the Taliban killed one person and wounded another in the city of Jalalabad, 120 km (75 miles) east of the capital. Bush flew into Kabul by helicopter after landing at the U.S. base at Bagram and dined with troops at the base before leaving just a few hours later. Addressing an audience at Kabul University, Bush spoke of women's role in democracy as Afghanistan moves on from the success of October's presidential election. "Democracy is more than just elections. The survival of a free society ultimately depends on the participation of all of its citizens, both men and women," Bush, a former school teacher and librarian, said. Visiting a project for a women's dormitory at a teacher training institute, Bush was welcomed by girls in traditional red and green velvet costumes, before meeting village teachers, all with their heads covered, some with their faces covered too. In the audience the only burqas -- the traditional head-to-toe garment most Afghan women wear -- were bundled up on laps or stuffed in handbags. They had been removed while going through security to the auditorium. Rights groups routinely decry violence against women and children and, while the militant threat has receded, many ordinary Afghans fear rising violent crime. But Afghanistan has made early strides in education, with a record number of over 5 million children in school. Although 60 percent of girls remain outside the education system, that compares with almost 100 percent excluded under the Taliban. "Thanks to you millions of little girls are going to school in this country, little girls who were denied an education just three years ago," Bush told troops at Bagram before she left. Bush announced U.S. grants of $17.7 million to build an American University of Afghanistan and a second, of $3.5 million, for an International School of Afghanistan to enable children from kindergarten to grade 12 to receive a U.S.-style education. Washington has committed $80 million for education projects in Afghanistan. GIRLS "WILL GET TO HAVE A VOICE" "As more girls get to read and write they will get to have a voice. Girl's schools will be a radical change and Afghanistan will be changed," Womens' Affairs Minister Masooda Jalal told Reuters. Money going into education still pales alongside the overall U.S. budget for Afghanistan. Planned spending was doubled this year alone to $5.2 billion. President George W. Bush has never been to Afghanistan, but often cites it as a symbol of success on the road to democracy. During her visit on Wednesday, his wife spoke to U.S. troops serving in Afghanistan and met President Hamid Karzai. "He really wants our troops to stay here, he thinks it's very important to their stability," she told reporters on the plane home. "They (Afghans) don't want to be abandoned by the United States." Die-hard militant opposition to Karzai was emphasised by the car bomb blast in Jalalabad, the latest incident in a fresh wave of militant violence. The person who died was in the car that exploded in front of the provincial governor's office, a police station and an adjacent state television building, officials said. Taliban spokesmen Abdul Latif Hakimi said the Islamist guerrillas were behind the attack and others elsewhere in the country recently, including a mine blast that killed four American soldiers in Logar province on Saturday. On Tuesday, two U.S. soldiers were wounded in an ambush in the central province of Uruzgan and overnight two rockets hit a section of the airport in the western city of Herat occupied by U.S. soldiers, but caused no casualties, the U.S. military said.
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