The United Nations on Wednesday said that Afghanistan under the Taliban regime has become the “most repressive country in the world” for women’s rights.
“It has been distressing to witness their methodical, deliberate, and systematic efforts to push Afghan women and girls out of the public sphere,” said Roza Otunbayeva, special representative of the UN secretary general and head of the UN political mission in Afghanistan, in a statement on International Women’s Day.
The Taliban administration, which seized power in August 2021 as United States-led forces withdrew from Afghanistan after 20 years of war, has effectively deprived women of all their basic rights.
Women are banned from education and employment in non-governmental organisations and in the government. They are also barred from going to parks, gyms and public baths and have been ordered to cover themselves from head to toe. Women cannot even travel long distances without a male guardian.
On Wednesday, Otunbayeva said the Taliban’s crackdown on women’s rights was a “colossal act of national self-harm”. She warned that such actions were likely to lead to a drop in aid and development funding in Afghanistan.
“It will condemn not only women and girls, but all Afghans, to poverty and aid-dependency for generations to come,” she added. “It will further isolate Afghanistan from its own citizens and from the rest of the world.”
At a time when Afghanistan needs to recover from strife caused by decades of war, she said, “half of the country’s potential doctors, scientists, journalists, and politicians are shut away in their homes, their dreams crushed and their talents confiscated”.
Taliban authorities have justified the slew of restrictions on women saying that they are in accordance with its strict interpretation of Islamic law. Despite international outrage, they have shown no signs of backing down.
Meanwhile, addressing the Security Council in New York on Wednesday, India’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Ruchira Kamboj also expressed concern about the Taliban’s increasing actions to squeeze women out of public life.
She said the rights of women and minorities need to be fully respected. “As a contiguous neighbour and long-standing partner of Afghanistan, and given our strong historical and civilisational linkages to the Afghan people, India has direct stakes in ensuring the return of peace and stability to the country,” Kamboj said.
She also said that the Afghanistan territory should not be used for sheltering, training or financing of terror acts.
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