Women’s rights activists in Afghanistan are calling on the men of the country to stand up against the Taliban’s repressive practices against girls and women.
The leader of Women’s Movement for Freedom, Tahira Naseri, said the widespread arrests of girls and women in Kabul under the pretext of ‘improper hijab’ are inhumane and an affront to the dignity of Afghans.
On January 1, Taliban forces began a campaign of cracking down on girls and women wearing open-faced hijabs, detaining them and taking them to an unknown location often without informing their families. The group has argued that the girls and women were breaking the law with inappropriate head coverings.
Ms Naseri said the practice was an extension of the Taliban’s restrictions on women, with around 60 decrees against girls and women’s freedom since the group came to power in August 2021.
She said Afghan women and girls have protested all of the restrictions, but they need Afghan men to stand against them too.
At a public protest last week, Ms Naseri called on Afghan men to not allow their wives, daughters, and sisters to become victims of the Taliban’s extremist ideology that is violating their dignity and respect.
Women’s Movement for Freedom member Fatima Karimi said at the protest that Afghan women and girls have never been so disrespected as under the Taliban.
Ms Karimi called on the United Nations, the international community and human rights organizations to take more action to stop the ongoing arbitrary arrests of women and girls.
Fellow activist and movement member Noshin Shahrzad joined her voice to the protest saying the arrests targeting girls across Afghanistan’s Kabul is causing panic among families.
She said the Taliban’s actions are not rooted in any religion or ritual and are only aimed at removing women from public and from society.
Former MP Fawzia Kufi has expressed her concern in a post on X, formerly Twitter, saying the Taliban are using the world’s distraction with other conflicts to crack down on women’s freedom even more.
“As the world shifted focus to another awful war in Gaza, Taliban think they are not being watched. They have expedited their war against women. On a daily base, their morality police arrest tens of women from streets of Kabul,” she posted on X.
“To the Taliban, every woman in Afghanistan is guilty to be proven innocent. There were over 1000 meetings with Taliban since their return to power. Did anyone hold them to account for the promise they made during negotiations to demonstrate a so called 2.0 Taliban?” Ms Koofi continued.
Former Afghan MP and Jihad leader Abdul Rab Sayaf has also condemned the Taliban’s recent move.
“What is your religious justification for touching and pulling a woman whom you are not a mahram [male chaperone] and beating them? And taking them to the prison where men are the guards of the jail. Until now, there is no consensus among scholars regarding prison for men, let alone imprisoning women. Fear God and people,” he posted on X.
“You trampled the Islamic values and national traditions of the country. I am sure that if the men and women of the country are addressed in a good and humane tone, they will follow Islamic principles and national values in their clothes and other aspects of their lives. And you, with your arrogant and ugly behavior, have turned people away from religion and reduced the love of religion in their hearts.”
Leader of a Taliban resistance group National Resistance Front of Afghanistan Ahmad Masood, who lives outside Afghanistan, has also condemned the crackdown.
“What is being implemented today under the name of [Islamic] Sharia against the honorable and brave women of Afghanistan cannot be reconciled with the principles and values of the Islamic religion, nor with any divine or human religion,” he posted on X.
“Afghanistan has gone through many bitter and difficult times. However, the women of our country have never faced such level of disrespect and crime. Kidnapping, torture, harassment, and dishonoring brave women of Afghanistan, at the same time as it is the most heinous type of crime against humanity, brings heavy historical responsibilities to the Taliban forever.”
Former Ambassador of Afghanistan to Norway Shukria Barakzai said the Taliban is aiming to destroy Afghanistan in an interview with an Afghanistan international news channel.
“The Taliban want the destruction of all historical values and the destruction of the Afghan people. This group does not understand, nor do they know the religious values. This criminal group does not respect human values and human rights. The situation in Afghanistan is far more serious and catastrophic than what is reflected in the media,” Ms Barakzai said in the interview.
“For this reason, Afghanistan has reached a stage where it is necessary to start a people uprising against this criminal group. The hijab is an excuse. Afghan women’s clothing does not have any religious problem. By torturing, harassing, and imposing restrictions on women’s lives, the Taliban seeks to further humiliate Afghanistan and blackmail more world powers,” she added.
