100 US scholarships for Afghan students

KABUL (PAN): The US embassy in Kabul on Monday said it had arranged 100 Fulbright scholarships for Afghan students.

In an exclusive interview, the embassy spokesman told Pajhwok Afghan News the scholarships in five sections would be provided for the 2014 and 2015.

“The scholarships would be available for doctoral and master’s studies, and training university teachers,” Abbas Kamwand said, explaining the objective was to improve Afghan students’ capacity.

The Fulbright programme for Afghanistan that began in 1952 sponsored over 150 American and 250 Afghan students till 1979. 

Later, the programme stayed suspended for 23 years until it was restarted in 2003 with the reopening of the US embassy in Kabul.  391 Afghans had so far availed the facility, he said.

For cultural and family reasons, the Afghans rarely allow female students to join the scholarship programme. As a result, the US government had decided to provide the facility for women at American universities, he explained.

“One hundred special scholarships have been reserved for women at the American University of Afghanistan in Kabul and American university of Centeral Asia enable male and female students to equally benefit from the scholarships,” Kamwand concluded.

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