"Laila" awoke in the middle of the night for a glass of water, checked her phone almost by accident, and saw an email that made her stomach drop. The US would stop funding the American University of Afghanistan (AUAF), one of the last places women can still study in the country.
Laila said she sat on her bed, staring, her thoughts racing through the past five years and everything she had endured just to get an education.
It had not been easy to find a way to study in Afghanistan after the Taliban outlawed women's education.
The American University campus was already taken over by the Taliban, but she could study secretly through the university's online program. But now that the university is losing its financing, she told DW she and her classmates fear it will shut down entirely. Her name has been changed for safety reasons.
(...)
The US State Department told DW that the university is "free to identify other funders and partners, so the end of their receipt of American taxpayer money does not necessarily equate to an end to their operations."
But without the $25 million grant the State Department recently refused, the university's future is in doubt.
(...)
