EU’s Borrell: ‘Gender Apartheid’ Exists in Afghanistan

In a meeting in Brussels, Josep Borrell Fontelles, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, spoke about the existence of gender discrimination after the re-establishment of the Islamic Emirate in Afghanistan.

Borrell Fontelles said that discrimination in Afghanistan is not based on skin color but based on gender.

“Who remembers what is happening in Kabul? Afghanistan has disappeared from the media, in Afghanistan you have gender apartheid, I think it is a good way to call what is happening there gender apartheid, not by the color of the skin but by gender, women and girls are deprived from going to going to schools and an awful dictatorship is ruling the country,” said Josep Borrell Fontelles.

However, the Islamic Emirate has previously denied the existence of gender discrimination in the country and said that the rights of all citizens, especially women, are protected within the framework of Islamic Sharia.

Some women’s rights activists asked the international community to take action to remove restrictions against women in Afghanistan.

“If we look at the situation of Afghan women in the last forty years, Afghan women have become victims as a result of wars and failed policies,” said Dewa Patang, a women’s rights activist.

“Work and education are the rights of every human being. Taliban should give Afghan women and girls the right to work and study like in other Islamic countries. The restrictions imposed by the Taliban on women and girls are not even included in the Islam Law,” said Lemia Sherzai, a women’s rights activist.

Meanwhile, there have been many concerns about the situation of women in the country during the two years since the takeover of the Islamic Emirate, but in response to these concerns, the Islamic Emirate said that the rights of all citizens, especially women, have been given to them within the framework of Islamic Sharia.