Education International will organize a memorial for the teachers who have been murdered in Pakistan recently. EI will also establish a girls’ scholarship fund to promote girls’ education and to support teachers and students victimised because of their support for girls schooling.
This week’s attacks on teachers and schools are a stark reminder to the world of the persistence of threats, intimidation, shootings, arson attacks and sometimes even murder that are the Taliban’s weapons in a war against girls’ opportunity.
“We will not ever be intimidated by extremists, not in Pakistan and not anywhere else where we are fighting to accomplish the right to education which is still denied to 32 million girls worldwide,” says Fred van Leeuwen, General Secretary of EI. With the Pakistani teachers organisations and the country’s labour confederations, Education International considers organizing a public rally in one of Pakistan’s main cities bringing together all of those who are opposed to the current wave of violence against schools and who wish to see all children attending school.
“We work closely together with the UN Special Envoy on Global Education,” says Van Leeuwen. Next week, Education International will issue a statement on girls’ education. Van Leeuwen stresses the importance that maximum pressure be exerted on the Pakistani authorities.
Last October, shocked by the attempted assassination of Malala Yousafzai, more than three million people signed a petition that resulted the national government to agree to legislate compulsory free education and provide stipends for three million children.
Van Leeuwen highlights: “It is of vital importance that everyone who cares about girls’ education once again signs the petition at http://www.educationenvoy.org to ensure the safety of these girls’ teachers.”