Afghanistan’s Taliban insurgents say they are going to spend $1 million on opening schools in areas they control to counter the propaganda of the West and the Western-backed government. The Taliban banned girls from education during their rule, and have attacked hundreds of schools and killed some teachers and pupils in recent years as part of their war against the government and its Western backers. “The aims are to reopen schools so children who are deprived can benefit and secondly, to counter the propaganda of the West and its puppets against Islam, jihad and the Taliban,” a Taliban spokesman, Abdul Hai Mutmaen, said by telephone from an undisclosed location. “Students will be taught subjects that are in line with Islamic teaching and jihad,” he said late on Saturday.
In another development on Sunday, a suicide bomber in a car targeted a NATO convoy just south of Kabul. The bomber was killed in the blast.