According to the United Nations, the militant Islamist Taliban who rule in Afghanistan are increasingly trying to force women out of public life. Taliban leaders are institutionalizing “large-scale and systematic” discrimination and violence against women and girls, a group of UN human rights experts said Monday in a statement from the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
For example, the Islamists prohibited women from returning to their jobs or using public transport alone; they required them to be accompanied in public by a man or imposed strict dress codes on them. In addition, institutions that are supposed to protect the rights of women and girls – the Women’s Ministry, the Independent Human Rights Commission, women’s shelters or special facilities to combat violence against women – have been closed or occupied.
The continuing denial of the fundamental right to secondary and higher education is also particularly worrying, the statement said. The majority of girls’ schools from the 7th grade are currently closed. Female students can currently only attend private universities.
Recently there have been increased protests by girls and women in Afghanistan for more rights or against the killing or kidnapping of women in the country. In the past, Taliban fighters had repeatedly beaten, threatened or detained demonstrating women. Recently, protests have increasingly migrated to social media. Recently, a woman apparently burned a burqa in an inner courtyard. This is considered to be the type of cover-up preferred by the Taliban.
