Western Concern Over Afghan Women's Rights

"It sends a clear message not just to the Afghan government, but to other donors as well, that this is an important issue and it's something other people should speak about."
Heather Barr, Human Rights Watch

In this December 2011 file photo, an Afghan policeman keeps watch as women wait in line to receive winter supplies at a centre for needy refugees on the outskirts of Kabul. Ottawa Citizen

Canada has come out with a warning about a law proposed in Afghanistan, concerned that all the sacrifices made on behalf of turning the country into a respectable vestige of an Afghan-style democracy is being upturned, at the very least as it pertains to the human rights, dignity and safety of Afghan women and children. A new law has been proposed, already passed by the Afghan parliament, awaiting President Hamid Karzai's signature.

The law stands to prohibit authorities from questioning any relatives of a criminal suspect. Victims would be silenced. Investigations into cases of sexual and domestic violence would be undermined. In a country noted for the prevalence of forced marriages and the acceptance within society of "honour killings", this backward slide would mark a death knell to women's rights. If that happens, would stoning for adultery be far behind?

As the first of the Western countries to speak out in accusing the government of abandoning its pledge to protect Afghan women from the kind of violence so common in all too many Muslim societies where women are completely subjugated to their male relatives, held to a cultural code of female modesty and the acceptance that they can be treated harshly by their husband, brothers and fathers, the hope is that the conscience of other countries will be equally stricken.

Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Lynne Yelich, after a trip to Afghanistan, saw the need to raise the alarm. And the Government of Canada has given instructions to its diplomats in Kabul to ensure that their counterparts are well informed of the impending law. That they will feel the need, as Canada does, to make an effort to persuade Hamid Karzai to reject its imposition.

In response, British Foreign Secretary William Hague indicated his concern, stating his country's ambassador was engaged in "urgently" raising the matter with Afghan Authorities. International disinterest in Afghanistan is the norm, even while women's rights have seen a slow roll-back in the year just passed. There has been a 20% reduction in seats reserved for women in provincial councils.

Afghan parliamentarians have attacked the country's Western-guided Law on Elimination of Violence Against Women. And, in fact, in November of 2013 an attempt was made to re-introduce the practise of stoning adulterers to death. The assaults and assassinations of female Members of Parliament and vocal women activists has been on the increase.

Afghan women walk in a graveyard alongside a shrine in Herat, on January 19, 2014 (AFP/File, Aref Karimi)

All this, just as Western countries, weary of a dozen years of grappling with the country's violence, backwardness and social/cultural/religious strictures are preparing to withdraw their presence in the country, as indeed they have been urged to do by President Karzai. Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Lynne Yelich made it clear that Canada remains committed to "hard-fought gains regarding the rights of women and girls are not rolled back for a false sense of stability".

It is entirely likely that President Karzai seeks to appease the Taliban with whom he is attempting to negotiate an agreement for a cessation of brutally violent hostilities, promising to welcome their leaders into a coalition government for Afghanistan. This is the leader of the country who now and again collapses into a rage over the brutality of foreign military in his country causing the unfortunate deaths of civilians in their efforts to counter the Taliban.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai wants the US to stop military operations and bring the Taliban to the negotiating table before he signs the Bilateral Security Agreement (BSA) (AFP/File, Johannes Eisele)

Canada has spent roughly $10-billion in treasury over the decade and more that it has been involved with NATO troops attempting to beat back the Taliban and bring a semblance of security to a country mired in medieval thought. In the process bringing compassion and relief to the women of Afghanistan, ushering in an era of quasi-equality and forward-thinking toward the future. Now the future that was contemplated as a potential rescue from the shackles of cultural history looks very much like the dismal past.

While 50,000 NATO-led troops remain in the country, they will be withdrawn by the end of the year. But President Karzai has insisted that the foreign aid lavished on his government and his country be continued, recommending that to become independently successful and to maintain the costs of its security police and military as the most expensive government item, $7-billion might be appropriate.

As it happens, a new United Nations Assistance Mission Afghanistan report highlights the fact that the year just passed marked the highest number of casualties for women and children through "ground engagements" and improvised explosive devices (IEDs), the clear weapon of favour of the Taliban. The decline in civilian deaths, particularly among women and children that was noted in previous years, has been reversed.

The newly-revealed death toll is close to matching the peak figure of 3,133 in 2011 in the conflict that has claimed the lives of 14,064 civilians in the past five years. UNAMA attributes the vast majority of these deaths -- 74% -- to "anti-government elements" led by the Taliban. The Taliban, the enemies of peace and stability, human rights and gender equality lauded by President Karzai, as his "brothers", even while he vociferously upbraids Western allies for their disregard for the safety of the Afghan people.

The Afghan interior ministry itself, in a statement it issued laid an accusation against the Taliban of using civilians as "human shields" and of "deliberately targeting" them. Future prospects for the country appear quite wonderful, if one regards those prospects from the perspective of the fundamentalist Islamists. Horribly dismal, the fate of Afghan women and children, being re-adjusted to reflect the worldly view of the Taliban.

In this photograph taken on April 4, 2013, wounded Afghan children receive treatment at a local hospital after a Taliban attack in Farah province (AFP, Aref Karimi)