Thursday | 23 January 2025 | Reg No- 06
বাংলা
   
Thursday | 23 January 2025 | Epaper

Gross violation of Afghan women’s human rights

Published : Sunday, 8 December, 2024 at 12:00 AM  Count : 476
Farnaj Zaman
Afghanistan has fallen to its knees in spite of the Taliban's claims of stability and peace. A year ago, when the radical Islamists captured Kabul, life changed drastically, particularly for women. Women are currently viewed as either "exotic extras" or "secondary objects for men's pleasure". Being a sorry state for affairs, Afghanistan's new morality laws are regressive for women. A ceaseless string of directives gradually eroded their liberties. The new virtue and vice law puts the Taliban on course to return the nation to the standards of their late 1990s control. 

By the time the Taliban unveiled their new interim government in 2021, the Ministry of Women's Affairs was vanished, and the new cabinet was devoid of women. In order to prevent temptation and the seduction of others, the Taliban claim that women are not permitted to talk or display their faces in public. To prevent getting corrupted, women are supposed to conceal their faces while they are around non-Muslim men. Afghan women have reportedly been prohibited by the Taliban from calling takbir or azan aloud, even to one another. The conveyance of unaccompanied female passengers, the playing of music, and the mixing of unrelated men and women are all prohibited by Article 19.

Women who employed as teachers in universities and schools for boys were fired; women journalists were forced out of their positions; women and girls' access to higher education was subjected to new, burdensome restrictions; prominent women and rights activists were harassed, many of whom fled in fear; and women's sports were outlawed.

In the early weeks of the law's enactment, the morality police ordered female salon owners to close their businesses because they were barred from working; merely because they provided services was against Islamic law and had a negative financial impact on the grooms' families during the festivities. Women were only allowed to open stores after a week, though, if women wore long scarves and a black veil.

 Afghani women's mental health deteriorated during the Taliban, and the ministry was fueling a culture of fear and intimidation among Afghans. Women's suicides have also increased, according to media reports. On structures, the exposed faces of female models are painted out. The Taliban essentially holds that women should virtually vanish from public life. The biggest shift is the Afghan women's lack of hope, believing that the world has completely abandoned them. It is not just a significant defeat for Afghan women, but it is a bigger blow to gender equality and human rights in general.

Now, going viral is an old video of Taliban members laughing when asked if women should run for office. On September 14, 2024, Imams at a few mosques in Kandahar received orders from Vice and Virtue enforcers to forbid women from using smart phones. The Afghan women no longer remember what freedom under Taliban 2.0 is like. Women who had worked on a UN project and aspired to a political career in Kabul now feel "like prisoners,". They are like silent shadows dead bodies wandering around.



A legislation prohibiting news organizations from publishing pictures of living things will be enforced, according to Afghanistan's Taliban Ministry of Morality. Kandahar and Helmand are two provinces where the law has been fully enforced. Senior Taliban officials cannot be discussed without referring to them by their religious titles, and critics will not be permitted. It is anticipated that the media will act as a government extension. The situation is even worse for female journalists, who are prohibited from working in state media, denied access to most Taliban press conferences, and prohibited from interviewing male subjects.

Afghanistan has been referred to as "gender apartheid" by UN and other officials, and it is rated bottom on the Women, Peace, and Security Index. Afghan women are risking everything to protest against the Taliban, including being watched, harassed, attacked, arbitrarily detained, tortured, and forced into exile. After UNAMA condemned the July 31 decree that silenced women, the Taliban declared in August 2024 that they would no longer work with the agency. 

Reports of torture and rape have been made by Afghan women detained under the Taliban's anti-begging legislation. Numerous people who are compelled to plead for their lives claim experiencing forced labor and seeing violence against youngsters. The poor are still unsupported and fear re-arrest despite assurances of relief.

Afghan women are demonstrating their individuality and resistance of persecution by dancing in traditional clothing in response to the Taliban's limitations, as evidenced by social media videos. The percentage of women employed in the public sector was 26 percent, but it has subsequently dropped to almost nothing. In the midst of the social and economic unrest, a lot of Afghan women are pursuing entrepreneurship as a means of supporting their families and regaining their freedom.
Women in the province of Herat are gathering saffron and contributing to a very prosperous industry as well as to their own lives. In addition to empowering women, the Afghanistan Women's Voice Movement, spearheaded by Hadia Sahibzada, hopes to strengthen ties between different societal groups and encourage a team effort to confront structural inequalities. These women are changing the conversation about Afghan identity, resiliency, and hope for a more just future through their writing, art, and public protests.  

Australia, Canada, Germany, and the Netherlands intend to bring the Taliban before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for their failure to respect Afghanistan's commitments to protect women's and girls' human rights. Numerous nations have declined to openly acknowledge the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan, notably those in the West. The group may use this lack of recognition as a tactic to maintain pressure on it to modify its rules. Clear progress on women's rights should be a prerequisite for the Taliban to be recognized internationally. Experts urged international actors to create a strong, well-coordinated strategy on Afghanistan that prioritizes human rights, specifically gender equality and women's rights. 

The writer  is a student of the Department of International Relations, Bangladesh University of Professionals (BUP)


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