Monthly Archives: December 2003

Keeping children in school

By Zubeida Mustafa
Source: Dawn

UNESCO recently released its annual Education for All: Monitoring Report and in it Pakistan unfortunately doesn’t emerge in a very good light. The six millennium goals laid down at the education forum in Dakar in 2000 were 1) the attainment of universal primary education; 2) gender equality; 3) improvement in literacy rate; 4) boosting quality of education; 5) increasing life skills; and 6) introducing early childhood learning programmes. The deadline for these goals was set for 2015.
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Will there be peace?

By Zubeida Mustafa
Source: Dawn

AS the prospects of peace in South Asia become brighter, one waits with bated breath to see the outcome of the recent initiatives in the region. There have been so many false dawns that it is difficult not to feel sceptical.

Didn’t we see the promise of peace emanating from Tashkent in 1966, Simla in 1972, Lahore in 1999 and Agra in 2001, which all came to nought? Each time we were told in a burst of euphoria that it was to be different on that occasion, only to find ourselves back to square one before long.
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