You may have seen the hopeful pictures the other day of a group of female medical students newly arrived in Scotland from Afghanistan. You may have heard them talking excitedly about the chance to complete their studies here. You may also have heard one of the students describe their efforts to get to Scotland as a “thousand days of suffering”. Now, at least, there’s hope the suffering will end.

The reason the students have come to Scotland is the grim reality of Afghanistan under the Taliban and the regime’s ongoing clampdown on women’s rights and education. One of the students, Zahra Hussaini, said she used to think the Taliban might change in the 21st century. But no. Since they returned to power three years ago, it’s been as bad as ever, with women banned from studying at university.

There was a time, not so long ago, when there were some positive signs in the country, which I saw for myself when I was in Afghanistan prior to the Taliban’s return. I visited a college in Kabul and talked to some amazing young women who were studying to be engineers. They told me of their hope that things were starting to change after the hard years under the Taliban. But they also told me they were anxious about how fragile their new rights to go to college and study might be. Turned out: very fragile.

The fact that 19 young women have now been able to escape the regime and........

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