WUNRN
AFGHANISTAN - SCHOOLGIRLS &
TEACHERS SICK FROM POISON GAS
By
CNN Wire Staff - August 25, 2010
An
Afghan schoolgirl suffering from suspected poisoning receives treatment
Wednesday at a hospital in
The latest incident, this one at a high school, is the ninth such case involving the poisoning of schoolgirls, said Asif Nang, spokesman for the nation's education ministry.
Dr. Kabir Amiri said 59 students and 14 teachers were brought to the hospital, and were faring better.
"We don't have good equipment to verify the kind of
gas that they were poisoned with, but we have taken their blood tests to send
to
Many Afghan girls were not allowed to attend school during the Taliban's rule from 1996 to 2001. Girls' schools began reopening after the Islamist regime was toppled. The United Nations children's agency, UNICEF, estimates that 2 million Afghan girls attend school these days.
But female educational facilities, students and teachers
have come under vicious attack as the insurgency has strengthened and spread
from Taliban strongholds in the southern provinces of
A report compiled last year by the humanitarian agency
CARE documented 670 education-related attacks in 2008, including murder and
arson. Much of the violence in what CARE called an "alarming trend"
occurred at girls' schools.