By RAHIM FAIEZ

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Afghan authorities are closing education centers and institutes supported by non-governmental groups in the south until further notice, officials said Monday. The centers are mostly for girls, who are banned from going to school beyond sixth grade.

The Education Ministry ordered the Taliban heartland provinces of Helmand and Kandahar to close education centers and institutes while a committee reviews their activities. It did not provide an explanation for the closures and a ministry spokesman was not immediately available for comment.

Mutawakil Ahmad, a spokesman for the Kandahar education department, confirmed that education centers’ activities are suspended until further notice. “The decision was made after people’s complaints,” said Ahmad, without providing further details.

Despite initial promises of a more moderate rule than during their previous stint in power in the 1990s, the Taliban have imposed harsh measures since taking over the country in 2021 as U.S. and NATO forces were pulling out of Afghanistan after two decades of war.

The female education ban extends to universities. Women are barred from public spaces, including parks, and most forms of employment. Last year, Afghan women were barred from working at national and local NGOs, allegedly because they weren’t wearing the hijab, or Islamic headscarf, correctly and a gender segregation requirement wasn’t being followed. This order also includes the United Nations.

At least two NGO officials in Helmand confirmed they knew about the Education Ministry’s order. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak to the media.

One said the NGO was active in nine districts, offering around 650 classes with 20 to 30 students in each class. Girls and boys attend the classes, he said, but mostly girls as they can’t attend schools.

Most projects are from UNICEF, the U.N. children’s organization, with local NGOs working as sub-contractors or project implementers. Female and male teachers work in separate classes.

Ministry workers supervise all their activities, the official added.

Noone from UNICEF in Afghanistan was immediately available for comment.

An education official in Kandahar said many NGOs are active in the education sector and provide education for girls. But he said there is a need to review their activities as there is no accountability over their expenses and there are concerns over corruption and suspicions about centers and institutes being ghost schools. The official, a district director of education, spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

It was not clear how many centers and institutes were shuttered or how many students are affected in the two provinces because of the order.

The top diplomats from Russia, China, Iran and Pakistan attended a conference Thursday that focused on ensuring regional security in light of the situation in Afghanistan.

The foreign ministers of the four countries met in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, and discussed the need to cooperate with Afghan authorities to maintain political stability and to prevent a humanitarian crisis, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

The ministers also talked about the coordination of efforts to “counter the threats of terrorism and drug trafficking from the Afghan territory.”

Russia and China are among a few countries that have kept their diplomatic missions in Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul, since the Taliban took power in August 2021.

Moscow worked for years to establish contacts with the Taliban, even though it designated the group a terror organization in 2003 and never took it off the list. It hosted several rounds of talks on Afghanistan that involved senior representatives of the Taliban and neighboring countries.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang held separate talks on the sidelines of Thursday’s meeting to discuss a range of issues, including the situation in Ukraine, according to the Russian Foreign Ministry.

In a statement preceding the Uzbekistan conference, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said Beijing was ready to work more closely with Afghanistan’s neighbors and the international community for stability, security, prosperity, and development in both the country and wider region.

The statement reaffirmed China’s pledge to respect the independence, sovereignty, and territorial integrity of Afghanistan, as well as the choices made by its people. It called on the international community to firmly support Afghanistan to combat terrorism, and urged the United States to live up to its commitment to the country.

Beijing also expressed hope that Afghanistan’s interim government would continue working actively to meet its people’s interests and the international community’s expectations for an open and inclusive political structure.

Girls currently cannot attend school beyond sixth grade, and women are not allowed at universities in Afghanistan. Authorities present the education restrictions as a temporary suspension and not a ban, but universities and schools reopened in March without their female students.

Women also are barred from public spaces, including parks, and most forms of employment.

The policies have raised fierce international objections, increasing the country’s isolation at a time when its economy has collapsed and worsened a humanitarian crisis.

No country has recognized the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan.