Another International Women’s Day has come and gone and the women and girls in Afghanistan have precious little to show for it. Since the collapse of the Afghan Republic in August 2021 women have been at the forefront of efforts to fight for their own civil rights and the human rights of all Afghans, but they have paid a steep price for their efforts. Abductions, torture, killings, verbal abuse, and humiliation are all tactics of the Taliban-Haqqani terror group as they attempt to shut down the women’s rights movement.
As Oates and Nusratty plainly articulated, “Though all of Afghanistan is suffering, Afghan women and girls are suffering the most.” Here just a sample of the issues at hand.
Education declining
The world watched as the girl’s schools were closed and then those few that were opened heavily segregated men and women. While the Taliban pretend to re-open schools to please diplomats, close inspection reveals new Taliban standards and religious indoctrination are included. The Taliban are only allowing women to re-enter some schools in hopes that it will gain them international legitimacy and sanction relief. For them it is not about empowering women through education.
Vague Taliban statements
Hollow Taliban-Haqqani terror group statements about women’s rights needing to be tailored to Afghan customs are hiding Taliban views in plain sight. The Taliban are misogynists who believe that women are lesser and must follow strict Taliban guidelines to exist in society. They fear women expressing their views and participating in every day life. The Taliban version of normal culture is abnormal, and it means that women must be accompanied by a male relative in order to conduct every-day actions. They have forbidden women from travel outside the country and to even visit a government office if they don’t have a guardian that meets Talban standards. This is not Afghan culture; this is extremist culture that the madrassahs in Pakistan brainwashed the Talibs with.
Journalism declining
Since the August collapse of the Afghan Republic almost half of the media sector has collapsed as well. Women journalists and press staff have been hit the worst. About 80% of women in this career field were not able to return to work under the Taliban. That impact means about half the provinces in the country have no women working in the press. Increasing Taliban-Haqqani violence, intimidation, censorship, and even murder have severely impacted the free press. Even once safer areas for women journalists, like online platforms, have seen a massive 40-50 percent decrease in operations.
Women abducted and murdered
The Taliban are daily abducting women and adding them to their “hostage and detention program”, that is also aimed at pushing diplomats to talk to the Taliban and plead for the release of Afghan citizens. A top priority for the Taliban is to have public meetings and constant dialogue with the international community; it does not matter much if the purpose is negative or positive. Either way the Taliban-Haqqani terrorists are gaining legitimacy. The diplomats are using a dead-end approach to getting the Taliban to care about human rights or change their views. The evidence is clear every week as more women and girls show up dead on the streets, murdered by known and unknown killers—Afghanistan is not safe for women.
What can be done for Afghan Women
There are some simple and rapid solutions for diplomats engaging in Afghanistan. First, replace all male envoys with women immediately. Second, if women envoys must meet publicly with the terrorist Taliban-Haqqani misogynists, take lots of pictures of the events and share them widely in Afghanistan. Finally, diplomats can easily demand to only meet with Taliban women leaders, forcing the Taliban to scramble to find women to fill roles in government. The Taliban want more diplomatic meetings—they will suffer humiliation and damage their credibility with their fighters to get them.
The hardest part of any changes to the current situation will be getting all nation’s envoys to follow these simple guidelines—as always. It is time to make the Taliban-Haqqani thugs uncomfortable. This is something diplomats have refused to do when engaging with them for almost three decades. Taliban-Haqqani leaders will not change unless they are forced to; if they are capable of change at all.
