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"No one cares about us because we were born in
Afghanistan."
"We're going to die in history."
- Afghan girl's despair at the Taliban rule -
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“Is this really the 21st century?” People running
desperately toward aircraft, people hanging upside down on the stairs in an
attempt to board an aircraft, people clinging to an aircraft's wheels as it
takes off...
Crowds rushed into the Kabul Airport to flee
the country after the Islamic armed group Taliban reclaimed control of
Afghanistan. Afghans who had been going about their daily lives were thrown
into battlefields rife with violence and fear.
People all over the world witnessed how
easily modern civilization could devolve into an anti-civilized and violent
situation as they found the urgent scenes of the Afghan exodus more compelling
than a movie.
The two youths killed in a take-off crash of
a transport plane were ordinary Afghan boys aged 16 and 17. They were brothers
who supported their mother by selling fruits in the market in Kabul.
Even now, 38 million Afghans fear having to
choose a perilous escape route.
And the reality imposed on the weak and women in
need of protection among them is as perilous as standing on the edge of a knife.
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Who Are the Taliban?
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In Arabic, Taliban means "students." The Arabic word "Talib," which means "student," is combined with the Pashtun plural suffix "an"; in this case, "student" refers to a seminary student studying in a madrasa, a boarding school that teaches Islam.
What caused a group of theological students
studying God's teachings to become ruthless? To understand this, we need to
turn the clock back 40 years and look at developments since then.
When the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in
1979, the US-trained and supported mujahedin (warriors) to fight the Soviets. Theological
students were trained to be anti-Soviet warriors in Pashtun, southern
Afghanistan.
The
Taliban was founded in 1994 in Kandahar, Afghanistan's southernmost
province. From 1996 to 2001, they controlled roughly three-quarters of
Afghanistan under the leadership of Muhammad Omar.
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The country with the worst women's rights record in the world
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Women and minorities bore the brunt of the Taliban's atrocities during
their five-year reign. During this time, Afghan
women were unable to obtain an education, find work, or go out without male
protection, and they were barred from holding any public office. In
the face of the cruel reality of not being guaranteed basic human rights, women
helplessly endured ruthless violence.
▲ World Economic Forum Report:
'Global Gender Gap Report 2021'
https://www.weforum.org/reports/global-gender-gap-report-2021/digest
Women in Afghanistan have the lowest social status in the world as of 2021.
According to the World Economic Forum's Global Gender Gap Report 2021, Afghanistan ranked 156th out of
156 countries on the gender equality index.
It wasn't always like this. In fact, in the 1960s and 1970s, Afghans enjoyed a free atmosphere within Islamic society, and women openly walked around Kabul in miniskirts. However, with the Taliban in power, women's human rights deteriorated to a pre-modern level.
▲ UNESCO Statistical Institute data:
‘Afghanistan's education registration rates, women (reference data in September 2020)’.
https://data.worldbank.org/topic/education?locations=AF
The Taliban barred Afghan females from going out without being escorted by a male relative, going to school, or working.
In UNESCO's "Afghanistan Education
Institution Registration Rate, Women" graph, there is a break beginning in
1996. This means that education for females was halted entirely for a time.
Since 2001, when the Taliban stepped down and
a different Afghan government was established, the graph has risen
dramatically, restoring female educational opportunities. In 2018, approximately 83 percent of school-age Afghan females
were enrolled in educational institutions.
However,
due to the Taliban's reign, the graph is expected to plummet once more.
Women
were labeled as evil under common law.
What is
the Taliban's motivation for oppressing females? The foundations are based on Pashtunwali,
Deovanni, and Sharia Law.
1. Pashtunwali
Pashtunwali,
the Taliban’s main pillar, is the code of honor of the Pashtun people that
values the following virtues in a Pashtun man: hospitality, protection, honor,
and bravery.
The
Taliban interprets Islamic law based on Pashtunwali, but the Pashtunwali view
is overwhelmingly male-centered, with women regarded as evil beings.
According to Pashtunwali, women are completely owned by men and are merely tools for second-generation production.
2. Deobandi
Deobandi is an Islamic revivalist movement that occurred in India following British colonial rule. Afghanistan, as a neighboring country, was heavily influenced by the Deobandi concept, which completely excludes women from public spaces.
3.
Sharia law
Sharia law
is a way of life that all Muslims must adhere to, including prayer, fasting,
and charitable contributions to the poor. However, if Sharia law is interpreted punitively, it can be applied more
brutally to women than any other legal system in the world. The following are
the main characteristics of Sharia law:
- Extreme
punishment: Harsh physical punishments seen only in medieval society, such as
amputating hands for theft and stoning women to death for adultery.
- Extreme sexism: Sharia law has been revised by the Taliban to make women and non-Muslims increasingly vulnerable. As a result, even if a woman has been beaten or sexually assaulted, it is difficult for her to prove that she has been victimized.
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Under Taliban rule
A woman's life is miserable
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▲ Women wearing miniskirts and walking freely on the streets in the 1970s, and women covered their whole bodies with burka under the Taliban.
According to
a Human Rights Watch report published in 2020, brutal corporal punishment,
including extreme oppression and the suppression of freedom of religion,
expression, and education, was used on Afghan women during the Taliban's rule.
Directly
to Human Rights Watch: "Taleban-controlled Afghanistan's education, social
restrictions, and justice (2020)".
A report on Afghanistan's Education, Social Restrictions, and Justice categorize the Taliban's oppression of Afghan women in four areas.
1.
Education
When the
Taliban took power in 1996, laws
prohibiting girls over the age of eight from attending school were enacted.
As a result,
in Kabul alone, 106,256 girls and 8,000 female college students were expelled,
and 63 schools were closed. Women who desired an education had no choice but to
attend underground schools in secret, risking execution if discovered.
2.
Workplace
The
Taliban outlawed all employment of women on September 30, 1996.
The number of women fired totaled 7,793. Many women who had had jobs were forced to beg for money on the streets.
3. Well-being
When women
were examined by a male doctor, the Taliban required them to be fully clothed. This hampered a full examination and treatment, even if a woman
went to a small hospital with a female doctor.
Furthermore,
women's mental health was jeopardized by forced confinement and social
isolation. A survey of 160 women revealed that 97 percent had severe
depression and 71 percent had poor physical health.
4.
Punishment
Extreme
violence was used as a form of punishment under Sharia law. Women who violated Sharia law faced public repercussions such as
public beatings.
| Cases
of female punishment under the Taliban.
○ In
October 1996, the tip of a woman's thumb was amputated because she had painted
her nails.
○ In
1999, a mother with seven children was accused of murdering her husband at the
Kabul Gaji Sports Stadium and was executed in front of 30,000 spectators; she
was punished instead of her daughter, who was strongly suspected of the crime.
| Restrictions
on women under the Taliban.
○ Women
cannot walk down the street unless they are accompanied by a male blood
relative or are wearing a burka.
○ Men
should not have to hear the footsteps of a woman, so women should not wear
high-heeled shoes.
○ Women
should not speak loudly in public because strangers should not be able to hear
the voices of a women.
○ To
prevent women from being seen on the street, the windows on the ground and
first floors of all residential buildings should be painted or shuttered.
○ All
place names that contain the word 'female' should be modified; 'Women's
Garden,' for example, was renamed 'Spring Garden.'
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Struggling to be human
How to eliminate violence against women
(EVAW)
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Following
the fall of the Taliban regime in 2001, various efforts were made in Afghanistan
to promote women's rights.
It was a
difficult battle, but a number of non-governmental organizations and government
agencies attempted to reform Afghan laws so
they guarantee women's rights, which resulted in the enactment of the EVAW law
(Law on the Elimination of Violence Against Women) in August 2008.
This was the first law in Afghan history to criminalize violence against women, outlawing 22 violent acts against women, including rape, assault, forced marriage, prohibition on property acquisition, and denial of employment and educational opportunities.
Go
straight to Human Rights Watch:
"Afghanistan's Enforcement of the Act on the
Elimination of Violence against Women (2021).
Although
there were limitations, the human rights of women could be protected within the
boundaries of the law.
This
was the fruit of Afghan women's painful efforts. Human Rights Watch evaluated
the law on the Elimination of Violence against Women (EVAW) as "a slow but
true change and an advocacy pin for the efforts of Afghan women's human rights
groups to reform other laws."
However, with the Taliban's resurgence, the law is on the
verge of being scrapped.
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Women's rights dated back 20 years
in Afghanistan
The Taliban
seized Kabul, Afghanistan's capital, on August 15, and reclaimed power 20 years
after their earlier five-year regime. After the Afghan government surrendered
without a fight, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani fled the country.
The
Taliban vowed to respect the human rights of women under Sharia law, but the
Taliban brutally shot a woman who went out without a burka.
A woman dressed in
tight-fitting clothing was murdered for refusing to accompany a male relative.
▲ A hair salon in Kabul where women's faces on the wall were severely damaged by spray.
The politics
of fear has begun. Twenty years of work for Afghan women's human rights came to
naught in an instant. Burka prices are skyrocketing, and girls and women born
after 2001 who had never lived under the Taliban's rule find this reality
unfamiliar and frightening.
The world is watching
with bated breath as courageous Afghan women take to the streets to defend
human rights at the risk of their lives.
The risk is the fact that cruel triggers
can be pulled on these women at any time.
▲ On August 17, 2021, Afghan women protesting in front of Taliban soldiers demanding women's human rights.
The international community has urged the Taliban to protect its citizens’ human rights. The United Nations Secretary-General for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, has urged Taliban leaders to respect the rights of Afghans. She specifically warned them not to cross the fundamental red line of rights for women and girls.
How to Help Afghan Women
What
can we do to help the Afghan women who are terrified?
Dr. Sakena
Yacoobi, the mother of refugee education in Afghanistan and the winner of the
2nd Sunhak Peace Prize, is desperately appealing to the world for interest and
relief in Afghanistan.
"Our democracy could have imploded right now.
Anomalies,
on the other hand, do not go away so easily.
Even
the wind's whispers cannot be killed.
The
Taliban will not be able to derail their dreams.
Even if it takes longer than we anticipated, we will prevail."
- After returning to power, Dr. Sakena Yacoobi sent a letter to partners around the world.
(Sakena Yacoobi's Special Letter: http://www.sunhakpeaceprize.org/en/news/notice.php?bgu=view&idx=478)
Dr. Sakena Yacoobi,
who risked her life to run an underground school for girls under the Taliban in
the late 1990s, founded the Afghan Institute of Learning (AIL) in 1995 and has
been providing education and vocational training to thousands of refugees in
order to improve Muslim women's rights and social status.
The Afghans
will eventually return to a peaceful life, as Dr. Yacoobi predicted.
Even in the
midst of this ruthless violence, there are people with ideals and beliefs that
Afghanistan will rise again one day.
Everyone's
attention and solidarity are urgently needed so that women and children in
Afghanistan who have been harmed by the harsh reality do not abandon the
"heart of hope."
| How to
help Afghanistan
Make a contribution to the Afghan Learning Institute (AIL)
https://www.afghaninstituteoflearning.org/how-to-donate.html
For
a United Nations peacekeeping force
https://peacekeeping.un.org/en/contact
The International Committee of the Red Cross
https://www.icrc.org/en/contact
