Savaging Women's Human Rights in Afghanistan

Afghanistan's Taliban rulers have decreed that women should wear the all-covering burka in public and leave home only when necessary, a throwback to when the Taliban ruled the country between 1996 and 2001. (Shamil Zhumatov/Reuters)

"For all dignified Afghan women, wearing Hijab is necessary and the best Hijab is chadori [head-to-toe burka] which is part of our tradition and is respectful."

"If a woman is caught without a Hijab, her mahram [male guardian] will be warned."

"The second time, the guardian will be summoned and after repeated summons, her guardian will be imprisoned for three days."

Shir Mohammad, Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice

 

"This decision contradicts numerous assurances regarding respect for and protection of all Afghans’ human rights, including those of women and girls, that had been provided to the international community by Taliban representatives during discussions and negotiations over the past decade."

"The decision six weeks ago to postpone secondary schooling for Afghan girls was widely condemned internationally, regionally, and locally. Today’s decision by the Taliban might further strain engagement with the international community."

United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA)

 

A burqa-clad woman and a child walk past Taliban fighters along a roadside in Jalalabad, Afghanistan

It was expected, but it's still a shock to women in Afghanistan hoping that the return of the Taliban to government rule in their country abandoned by the West to the fundamentalist Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan whose leaders promised when they took power from the West-supported government in August of 2021 that Afghan women would not be shoved back to the Stone Age as they were in the Talibans' initial iteration when they ruled the country from 1996 to 2001.

 

It has now, after almost a year of rule, reneged on its promise and re-installed their original proscriptions against women appearing in public unless entirely covered but for their eyes, and in the company of a male family member. Music and dance are again disallowed. Women may no longer attend school, much less have employment outside of the home. All the stringent disallowals of the previous Taliban administration have been reintroduced.

 

This, in a country that is in a humanitarian crisis with over half the population facing malnutrition. International sanctions excluding the Taliban from major financial institutions have heavily impacted the collapsed economy. International investment dried up as soon as the Taliban returned to power. Afghan financial resources held overseas have been frozen rather than release them to the Taliban.

 

Afghan women and girls shout slogans demanding the reopening of high schools for girls during a demonstration in front of the Ministry of Education in Kabul, March 26, 2022  AFP

 

Afghanistan is once more back in the thrall of an oppressive, violent government, implementing -- as Afghan women suspected they would -- those same regressive and repressive laws targeting rights and freedoms of women. Segregation laws were brought to Herat decreeing women and men may no longer dine out in each other's company. Women must now remain at home unless it is absolutely necessary for them to venture forth at which time a male guardian must accompany them in public.

Parks are to be open to women exclusively on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, with men having exclusive use of the parks on the other four days of the week. Burkas have become the preferred coverings henceforth to obscure a woman completely from public scrutiny. Only eyes are to be exposed. The Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice is known to monitor the streets of the country looking out for any foolish enough to flout the law.

Disobedience to the new/old proscriptions will be viewed as a criminal offence. A far cry from the oleaginous statement for international consumption made by Zabiullah Mujahid when the Taliban spokesman said "our sisters, our men have the same rights" in an effort to reassure the world that the returned Taliban were now moderate and civil. It took little time however, before women were banned from working and girls prohibited from attending school beyond Grade 6.

"[Pre-Taliban Afghanistan was] a thriving cultural environment [with 3.6 million girls in school and a quarter of the seats in Parliament held by women]."

"I very much hope that very shortly we'll be able to agree on a product that expresses our collective agreement and concern about these latest developments."

Barbara Woodward, British UN Ambassador to the United Nations