Small groups of Afghan girls are staging fleeting protests outside the locked gates of schools in Herat (a major city in western Afghanistan), posing with textbooks and phone screens before scattering to avoid Taliban arrest. The demonstrations, organised by a local women's rights group called Golden Needle, are filmed and shared on social media within hours, offering a rare public act of defiance in a country where protest — especially by women — has been almost entirely suppressed since the Taliban returned to power in 2021. According to UNICEF, 2.2 million Afghan adolescent girls are currently barred from secondary education, a ban the United Nations has described as gender apartheid and a crime against humanity, with more than 130 Taliban decrees since 2021 also stripping women of basic rights to work, movement, and healthcare.