Press TV / January 12, 2016

At least three schoolgirls have lost their lives and eight others sustained injuries in a mortar attack by the Taliban militant group in Afghanistan’s eastern province of Khost.

The Afghan Ministry of Education announced in a statement that a mortar round slammed into a primary school in the Bak district of the province, which is located some 140 kilometers (87 miles) southeast of the capital, Kabul, on Monday.

Taliban militants have banned female education in the areas where they hold sway, depriving thousands of girls of their right to education. The number of girls enrolled in schools has dramatically dropped in those regions due to the threats as well as actual attacks.

The Taliban has warned Afghan parents against sending their daughters to school. The extremists have destroyed tens of schools over the past several years.

Also, hundreds of thousands of children in Afghanistan’s eastern province of Nangarhar cannot go to school due to the presence of Takfiri Daesh terrorists in the area.

The spokesman for Nangarhar’s Directorate of Education, Mohammad Asif, said Daesh extremists have forced the closure of 58 schools, leaving some 300,000 boys and girls out of classrooms.

Nangarhar has been witnessing a rise in the presence of Daesh terrorists in at least seven of its districts in recent months.

Afghanistan is gripped by insecurity nearly 14 years after the United States and its allies attacked the country as part of Washington’s so-called war on terror. Although the 2001 attack overthrew the Taliban, many areas across Afghanistan still face violence and insecurity.