Today Malala Yousafzai denounced the EU Parliament’s invitation to engage with the Taliban on a migration deal. A country committing some of the worst human rights abuses towards women, girls and gender expansive people should be entirely un-welcomed at the decision making table.

“This is the same Taliban that banned girls from secondary schools and forced them into marriage. The same Taliban that, earlier this month, arrested dozens of women in Herat for how they were dressed. The same Taliban that detains, beats and executes women who dare to speak out or break their rules.

Through its system of gender apartheid, the Taliban have erased women and girls from public life. Europe must not legitimise a regime responsible for one of the worst human rights crises in the world.

Any engagement with the Taliban must begin and end with the rights of Afghan women and girls.” — Malala Yousafzai