Taliban official: Women banned from Afghanistan’s gyms

By RIAZAT BUTT

Associated Press/AP

10 Nov 2022

The Taliban are banning women from using gyms in Afghanistan, an official in Kabul said Thursday, the religious group’s latest edict cracking down on women’s rights and freedoms since they took power more than a year ago.

The Taliban overran the country last year, seizing power in August 2021. They have banned girls from middle school and high school, despite initial promises to the contrary, restricted women from most fields of employment, and ordered them to wear head-to-toe clothing in public.

A spokesman from the Ministry of Virtue and Vice said the ban was being introduced because people were ignoring gender segregation orders and that women were not wearing the required headscarf, or hijab. Women are also banned from parks.

The ban on women using gyms and parks came into force this week, according to Mohammed Akef Mohajer, a Taliban-appointed spokesman for the Ministry of Virtue and Vice.

The group has “tried its best” over the past 15 months to avoid closing parks and gyms for women, ordering separate days of the week for male and female access or imposing gender segregation, he said.

“But, unfortunately, the orders were not obeyed and the rules were violated, and we had to close parks and gyms for women,” said Mohajer. “In most cases, we have seen both men and women together in parks and, unfortunately, the hijab was not observed. So we had to come up with another decision and for now we ordered all parks and gyms to be closed for women.”

Taliban teams will begin monitoring establishments to check if women are still using them, he said.

A female personal trainer told The Associated Press that women and men were not exercising or training together before at the Kabul gym where she works.

“The Taliban are lying,” she insisted, speaking on condition of anonymity, fearing reprisals. “We were training separately.

On Thursday, she said two men claiming to be from the Ministry of Virtue and Vice entered her gym and made all the women leave.

“The women wanted to protest about the gyms (closing) but the Taliban came and arrested them,” she added. “Now we don’t know if they’re alive or dead.”

Taliban-appointed Kabul police chief spokesman Khalid Zadran said he had no immediate information about women protesting gym closures or arrests.

The U.N. special representative in Afghanistan for women, Alison Davidian, condemned the ban. “This is yet another example of the Taliban’s continued and systematic erasure of women from public life,” she said. “We call on the Taliban to reinstate all rights and freedoms for women and girls.”

Hard-liners appear to hold sway in the Taliban-led administration, which struggles to govern and remains internationally isolated. An economic downturn has driven millions more Afghans into poverty and hunger as the flow of foreign aid has slowed to a trickle.

Kabul-based women’s rights activist Sodaba Nazhand said the bans on gyms, parks, work, and school would leave many women wondering what was left for them in Afghanistan.

“It is not just a restriction for women, but also for children,” she said. “Children go to a park with their mothers, now children are also prevented from going to the park. It’s so sad and unfair.”

Taliban official: Women banned from Afghanistan’s gyms
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Afghans Call to Resume Passport Issuing

Residents of Kabul called on the Islamic Emirate to resume the issuing of passports.

The General Department of Passports announced one month ago that the distribution of passports would be halted for a temporary time.

“The frequent closing of the passport department, its reopening and closing many times–which we don’t know the reason for–will pave the way for fraud,” said Zabiullah, a passport applicant.

“We call on the Islamic Emirate officials to resume passport distribution through transparent ways,” said Massihullah, a passport applicant.

A spokesman for the General Department of Passports, Noorullah Patman, said that the distribution of passports has been halted due to technical problems.

“The process of passport distribution has been halted based on the order of the general head of the passport department due to technical problems, and the technical teams are working on it,” said Noorullah Patman, a spokesman for the General Department of Passports.

The distribution of passports has been halted more than five times since the Islamic Emirate swept into power. Three heads of departments have been changed thus far.

Afghans Call to Resume Passport Issuing
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Where learning is against the law: A secret school for Afghan girls

The house is a secret school for Afghan girls who are barred by the Taliban from getting an education. If agents raid the house, the girls will pull out their Qurans and pretend they are in a madrassa, or Islamic school, which the country’s new rulers still allow girls to attend.

“The Taliban are floating around in this area,” said Marina, 16, a 10th-grader. “So, I always carry a Quran in the open. My other books are hidden in my bag.”

More than a year after seizing power in Afghanistan, the Taliban still refuses to allow girls to attend secondary school, from grades seven to 12. The ban, as well as other hard-line edicts restricting women’s lives, have triggered global outrage and widespread protests by Afghan women.

But a more subtle form of defiance is also happening. Underground schools for girls have formed in the capital and other Afghan cities, hidden away in houses and apartments, despite the immense threat to students and teachers. For the girls and their families, it is worth the risk.

“It doesn’t matter if the Taliban becomes aware of this school,” said Angila, also 16 and in the 10th grade. “Education is my basic right. No one can take that away.”

Washington Post journalists made several visits last month to a secret school in Kabul where 25 girls were taught in various subjects for roughly two hours a day. Classes were kept short to lessen the chances of discovery by the Taliban. The girls and their teacher spoke on the condition that they be identified only by their first names, fearing retaliation from the authorities.

The Taliban has said repeatedly that secondary schools for girls will reopen when there is an appropriate “Islamic environment.” But the group has provided no criteria for what constitutes such an environment.

When the Taliban first seized power in 1996, it closed schools for all girls — then too, underground schools were formed to fill the void — banned women from working and forced them to wear head-to-toe coverings known as burqas whenever they ventured outside the home.

The group has been less draconian this time around, and the issue of education has revealed divisions among the Taliban’s leaders and religious scholars. In some areas, local Taliban officials have allowed girls above sixth grade to attend school, bowing to pressure from community leaders.

Last month, the Taliban’s deputy foreign minister, Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanikzai, made a rare public appeal urging that all secondary schools for girls be reopened, adding that “the delay is increasing the gap between [the government] and the nation.”

“Education is obligatory on both men and women, without any discrimination,” Stanikzai said in a televised speech. “No one can offer a justification based on sharia [Islamic law] for opposing this.”

But the hard-line conservative leaders who form the backbone of the movement remain opposed. And the Taliban has issued other restrictions, including mandating that women wear a face veil. Last month, a conservative cleric loyal to the hard-liners was appointed as the education minister.

Western governments have made clear that improvements in women’s rights are essential for the Taliban to gain access to $7 billion of foreign reserves frozen by the international community.

Abdulhaq Hammad, a top Taliban official in the Ministry of Information and Culture, insisted that “ninety percent of Taliban members are against the closure of the schools.” But convincing the remaining 10 percent is a delicate process.

“The Taliban don’t want to create any fragmentation amongst themselves; they don’t want to be broken from within,” Hammad said. “There are struggles with the 10 percent. But their unity is the secret of their success against the American invasion. If it’s broken, it will be very difficult to repair.”

Five months ago, a woman named Ayesha launched a collective of 45 underground schools around the capital. She was motivated in part by her bad marriage, she said: “Women should not be dependent on men. Education is the only way out of our difficulties.”

But within a month, her funds dwindled. Many of the schools closed. Others were shut down out of fear. Only 10 are active today, and Ayesha is struggling to find donors to support them. The girls in her schools come from the poorest families; with the Afghan economy collapsing, most can’t pay tuition or even buy textbooks.

Worse, she fears the Taliban will come for her. The group’s intelligence agency has summoned her three times, she said, forcing her into hiding.

“I don’t want to shut down these schools,” she said, looking determined. “They will continue.”

‘This is your right’

On a recent day, Ayesha took two Post journalists to one of her underground schools in Kabul.

Past the green gate was a compound with potted plants and flowers. There were rows of slippers at the entrance to the classroom, which was about the size of a one-car garage. Inside, the girls sat on the pink-carpeted floor in front of a small whiteboard. Next to it stood their teacher, Masouda. At 22, she was not much older than some of her students.

The ivory-colored frill curtains were drawn closed.

The students nervously stared at the Post journalists.

“Girls, you shouldn’t be afraid,” Ayesha assured them. “This is your right, and no one can take it from you.”

The girls recited a few verses from the Quran. Then class got underway.

“Today’s lesson is on pages 37, 38 and 39,” Masouda said, opening a biology textbook. “It’s about the types of plants and vegetables.”

She looked around. Only a few girls had the textbook.

“If someone doesn’t have a book, please take notes,” Masouda said, as she wrote on the whiteboard.

“Who would like to come up and explain this?”

Angila raised her hand. She stood and recited the lesson in a clear, authoritative voice.

Biology was her favorite subject, she explained after the class was over.

“I want to be a physician,” said Angila, who wore a head-to-toe black gown and a lime-green headscarf. “This is my dream. From childhood, I wanted to become a doctor.”

She was well on her way, part of a generation of girls and women that started attending school during the American occupation. When the Taliban regained power and ordered teenage girls to stay home, Angila was devastated.

“I watched the boys go to school, but I couldn’t,” she recalled. “My heart was broken.”

More than 45 percent of Afghans girls are not attending school, compared with 20 percent of boys, according to a recent report by Save The Children. The report also says 26 percent of girls are exhibiting signs of depression, compared with 16 percent of boys.

Masouda understands the psychological toll. After graduating from high school, she studied at a junior college. She was preparing for university entrance exams when the Taliban captured Kabul.

As the economy fell apart, her father and older brother lost their jobs. They agreed to host the school inside their home as a way to earn some money, and Masouda volunteered to teach.

“The school closures had a big impact on me, just like for the other students,” Masouda said. “It’s created mental problems for some students. To bring a sense of humanity, we share our knowledge.”

As Ayesha left the class, she reminded the girls to wear their hijabs, or headscarves, so the Taliban “will not make the hijab an excuse to stop you. If someone stops you, tell him you are going to attend class of holy Quran,” she told them.

‘They have spies’

Masouda’s younger brother has been given clear instructions not to open the green gate if anyone knocks, unless he recognizes the person on the other side.

“The Taliban are a bit far away from here, but they have spies,” said Masouda.

Three months ago, she stopped classes for 25 days after the Taliban arrested a teacher working in another underground school. If Taliban agents enter Masouda’s school, the girls know to open the cupboard and grab the Qurans.

Then, Masouda will ask Marina, who has memorized the Quran, to come forward.

“If they come, she will take over the class, and I will pretend to be a student,” Masouda said.

Marina, dressed in a traditional purple gown and a black headscarf, said that she’s attending the class “to gain courage.”

She wants to become a pilot for Kam Air, an Afghan carrier, because “there’s very little representation of women in the aviation sector.”

She raised her hand eagerly and answered a geography question, about the country’s longest river.

The next day, class began with chemistry and quickly moved to history. Most of the girls knew their country’s history, especially how women were treated.

Their mothers grew up under the first Taliban government and were never educated.

“My mother doesn’t want me to be illiterate, like her,” said Manizha, 18, a 12th-grader, who dreams of being a television journalist.

The last subject of the day was English. And it gave Masouda a chance to learn from her students. She asked Marwa to come to the front of the class.

“I like red color. What color do you like?” asked Marwa, 17, who says she wants to become a heart surgeon.

“Green,” Masouda said.

“What do you want to become in the future?” Marwa asked.

“A teacher,” Masouda said.

A few minutes later, class was over. The girls quickly filed out through the green gate.

Masouda erased the evidence from the whiteboard.

Sudarsan Raghavan is a correspondent at large for the Washington Post. He has reported from more than 65 nations on four continents. He has been based in Baghdad, Kabul, Cairo, Johannesburg, Madrid and Nairobi. He has covered the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the 2011 Arab revolutions, as well as 17 African wars.
Where learning is against the law: A secret school for Afghan girls
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EU Contributes €50 Million to WFP for Afghanistan

9 in 10 households cannot meet their food needs, with those headed by women particularly vulnerable, according to the latest WFP assessment.

The European Union (EU) donated €50 Million in aid for the World Food Program in Afghanistan, the WFP said in a statement, adding that it would help (WFP) to reach Afghan communities with livelihoods and resilience support.

The WFP said that due to unprecedented economic hardship and environmental disasters like earthquakes and flooding, the Afghans are less prepared than ever to weather another harsh winter.

9 in 10 households cannot meet their food needs, with those headed by women particularly vulnerable, according to the latest WFP assessment.

“This is a time of urgent need for Afghanistan. The people are reeling from the effects of four decades of conflict, climate hazards, COVID-19 and the socioeconomic crisis that have deprived people of their jobs and livelihoods across the country in the past year,” Raffaella Iodice, EU Chargée d’affaires to Afghanistan was quoted in the statement. “People who previously were able to put food on the table are now struggling and turning to humanitarian agencies to help steady them in this new reality. We are committed to helping the Afghan population, especially the most vulnerable. Our investment in WFP’s resilience programming is an investment that will have long-lasting, positive effects for local communities.”

Mary-Ellen McGroarty, WFP Afghanistan country director, said that the people of Afghanistan need support in building productive livelihoods more than ever.

“We are extraordinarily thankful to the European Union for this latest contribution. It allows WFP to continue our long-term livelihood and resilience work to help families be better prepared for and withstand environmental and man-made shocks. With skills training, young people and women, who are often the only breadwinners of their families, are empowered and have the means to support themselves and their families,” McGroarty said.

EU Contributes €50 Million to WFP for Afghanistan
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UK army killed 64 children in Afghanistan between 2006-14: Report

Al Jazeera

Published On 9 Nov 2022

The British army paid $165,332 in compensation after the deaths of 64 children in Afghanistan, a new report says.

British forces have paid compensation for the deaths of 64 children in Afghanistan, a toll four times higher than the 16 child deaths publicly acknowledged by the Ministry of Defence, according to a new report.

Action on Armed Violence (AOAV), a United Kingdom-based charity, found that the British government paid, on average, £1,656 ($1,894) in compensation for each person killed.

Between 2006-2014, “there were 64 confirmed child victims in Afghanistan where the British military paid compensation, although the number of children killed could be as high as 135”.

Additionally, AOAV found that between April 2007 and December 2012, there were 38 incidents involving the 64 child deaths.

The average age of a child killed was six years old, and air strikes were the most common cause of death listed.

‘Tragedy’

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Defence responded to the new report, saying: “Any civilian death during conflict is a tragedy, more so when children and family members are involved.

Compensation

Total payouts by the military amounted to £144,593 ($165,332), but the report explained this included the deaths of adults.

Families attempting to claim compensation for the loss of a relative were expected to show evidence, including birth certificates and interviews with British personnel, to confirm there was no affiliation with the Taliban.

“The majority of the 881 fatality claims brought to the ACO (Allied Commander Operations) were rejected. Just one-quarter of those received any compensation.”

Iain Overton, executive director of Action on Armed Violence, said: “The number of children killed following British military action in Helmand should give pause for thought.

“War invariably leads to death and modern war will always bring civilian casualties, but not reporting on such deaths – however much it might be a source of regret and horror to the soldiers involved in the killings and however accidental such deaths were – would be an omission of responsibility and an erosion of truth.

SOURCE: NEWS AGENCIES
UK army killed 64 children in Afghanistan between 2006-14: Report
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The Taliban wants to segregate women. So it’s training female doctors.

By Claire Parker

The Washington Post

November 5, 2022 at 3:11 p.m. EDT

KABUL — After the Taliban took control of Afghanistan last year, nearly a third of the resident doctors in Omeida Momand’s class at a Kabul women’s hospital fled the country, she said, leaving the staff stretched thin.

Momand decided to stay, to finish the last step in her 11 years of training to care for Afghanistan’s women. By day, she examines gynecology patients and monitors mothers with high-risk pregnancies in a room sometimes so crowded that patients lie on the floor. Night shifts are spent performing emergency Caesareans.

Her determination to practice medicine in her home country has aligned, ironically, with the Taliban’s own interests. In the highly conservative Islamic society the Taliban hopes to create, officials say, women should be cared for by other women. That means educating more female doctors.

This marks a rare instance of the Taliban publicly and loudly promoting women’s education and employment. Training female doctors and nurses is part of the movement’s effort to prove it can provide essential services while building a society structured on gender segregation.

Muhammad Hassan Ghyasi, acting deputy minister of public health, said in an interview that his ministry has received “clear instructions from the top level” to bring policies in line with the Taliban’s strict interpretation of sharia, or Islamic law. A new policy submitted recently to the Taliban’s supreme leader, Haibatullah Akhundzada, for approval would formalize a rule already applied in some hospitals that female health workers should treat women, while male health workers should treat men.

Ghyasi said the policy will stipulate that if there is no qualified female doctor available, a female patient can see a male doctor. But with Afghanistan’s health system under strain — and an economic crisis fueled by Western sanctions exacerbating hunger and sickness — the need for qualified medical professionals of both genders is greater than ever.

The Taliban effort to expand medical education for women, especially in fields traditionally dominated by men, contrasts with the government’s draconian restrictions on girls and women. Since taking power, the Taliban has barred many girls from secondary school and shut women out of most professions. This fall, authorities prohibited female university aspirants from enrolling in subjects including journalism, engineering and economics.

The educational restrictions seem certain to limit the number of women in the coming years who can train as doctors. Other Taliban policies, such as requirements in some areas that women only travel with male guardians, have hamstrung the efforts of female doctors to practice.

But at several government-run institutes for nursing, radiology and other health fields, the proportion of women admitted — at least 46 percent this semester — represents a slight increase compared with 2020 figures, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross, which supports the institutes.

Taliban authorities also point to residency programs like the one at Rabia Balkhi Hospital, where Momand works, as evidence of their commitment to educating female health workers. Hospital director Seemin Mishkin Mohmand said the Taliban health ministry has been supportive of her ambitions to expand the program and offer more-advanced training.

Momand is set to graduate this fall at the top of her class, and hopes to open a gynecology clinic in a rural province.

“When I was a child, this was my hope — to become a doctor, to serve my country and my people, especially to serve our poor women,” she said.

The needs in Afghanistan are enormous. The maternal mortality rate is among the highest in the world. Worsening malnutrition has contributed to a rise in premature births and pregnancy complications, according to Hamida Hamidi, a doctor at Rabia Balkhi and head of its training programs.

The health system, heavily reliant on foreign aid, neared collapse in the wake of the Taliban takeover. After billions in funding were cut, the ICRC and the United Nations stepped in last year to cover tens of thousands of health workers’ salaries. Still, some hospitals have closed. Significant numbers of doctors have left the country. And with war over, the volume of patients seeking care is rising.

The main hospital in Wardak, a province neighboring Kabul, used to be on the front line of fighting. Since the end of the war, the number of patients has doubled, hospital director Mohammad Nader Rahmani said.

As in many areas in Afghanistan, families here prefer that female relatives see women doctors. But while women make up a majority of patients, they account for only a quarter of the hospital’s doctors.

The hospital, run by the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan, recently hired a female radiologist, Rahmani said. But the limited pool of female health workers has made it difficult to hire more.

The Taliban’s stated goal of creating a separate but equal health system for men and women remains a distant dream, hospital administrators and international aid workers said. “In the short term, this policy is impossible to implement,” Rahmani said.

A dearth of specialists

In Afghanistan, as in many other countries, the essential task of caring for mothers and babies has long been dominated by women. Women make up a significantly smaller proportion of other medical specialists, Afghan doctors and hospital administrators say.

Six years ago, the World Health Organization raised the alarm about how a lack of female health-care workers was preventing Afghan women from receiving adequate care.

But it wasn’t always this way. When Hamidi was in medical school in the early 1990s, the country had female neurosurgeons and urologists, she recalled. When civil war broke out in 1992, many fled to the West. The Taliban took power, for the first time, four years later and “everything changed,” Hamidi said. Families grew uncomfortable with their daughters entering medical fields outside of maternal health, and that attitude outlasted initial Taliban rule.

At the hospital in Wardak and others run by international organizations, gender segregation has not yet been enforced, administrators say. The ICRC has also not observed gender segregation at government hospitals it supports, according to Lucien Christen, ICRC spokesperson for Afghanistan.

On a recent Saturday afternoon, a young woman named Shayma who had gone into labor arrived at the hospital in Wardak, needing an emergency C-section. The only doctors available at that time were men. After some convincing, Shayma’s husband and brother agreed to let two male doctors perform the operation alongside two female midwives. 

If male doctors had been prohibited from operating on women, “we would have lost our daughter and my grandson,” said Shayma’s mother, Sharifa, who uses only one name.

While gender segregation has not been enforced in the Wardak hospital, at least so far, three current or former female surgeons at public hospitals in Kabul said male and female staff have already been forced to work separately.

One of the surgeons, a first-year resident from Wardak, said she wanted to become a surgeon to help the women of her province. But in September 2021, Taliban officials barred women at her hospital from working night shifts and said they must work in separate rooms from their male colleagues.

“The problem is you cannot separate men and women because we need to work together,” said the resident, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation. “That’s why we stated we cannot be separated. They sent us home and suspended us.”

More than a year later, she has not been allowed to return to her post.

Kobra Safi worked at a teaching hospital in Kabul as a plastic reconstructive surgeon until August 2021, treating burn patients. Several days after Kabul fell, Taliban officials told her she could no longer have contact with her mentor, a male surgeon. “That destroyed my dream of doing plastic surgery,” she said.

Safi got on an evacuation flight two months later and spent nearly a year in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates before resettling in Canada this September.

Counterproductive policies

Even as the Taliban says it is looking to expand medical training for women, other policies are limiting the ability of women to provide health care — or access it.

Fouzia Shafique, senior health adviser for UNICEF in Afghanistan, said the agency is hearing more and more reports, especially in the country’s south and east, of women being told at health facilities that they must arrive with a male guardian to get treatment. Female health workers, meanwhile, have faced “significant issues” traveling to work in some areas because they must find a male relative to take them.

Ghyasi, the deputy health minister, said he had “not seen” reports of women being turned away from health facilities, though he added: “We are not denying it, because at the moment we have some problems.”

The pipeline for future female doctors is also narrowing. Schools in 24 out of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces remain closed to girls above sixth grade, U.N. special rapporteur Richard Bennett told the U.N. Human Rights Council in September.

The Taliban closed the high school Wajeha Kazimi, 19, attended just before she finished 12th grade. She was still able to graduate, and spent more than a year studying for the university entrance exam at a test-prep center in Kabul. In September, she survived a suicide bombing there that left more than 50 people dead.

Kazimi hopes to go into public health or pediatrics, and ranked medicine as her top choice on the university exam.

“When we were choosing, we remembered our friends who were killed who wished to become a doctor,” she said. Her 15-year-old sister, though, remains shut out of formal education.

The Taliban’s curbs on girls’ education are also costing the country some of its best male doctors. Five of the eight surgeons at the Emergency NGO-run trauma hospital in Kabul left the country after the Taliban takeover — some so their daughters could continue their schooling, medical coordinator Dimitra Giannakopoulou said.

Aid agencies continue to lobby Taliban authorities to reopen secondary schools for the sake of public health.

“Girls need to have finished high school if they’re going to enroll in a midwifery course, if they’re going to be a paramedic or if they’re going to train as vaccinators,” Shafique said. “And we now have two years of which we have no cohorts graduating out of high school and therefore no people to train.”

Susannah George and Zahra Nabi in Kabul contributed to this report.

The Taliban wants to segregate women. So it’s training female doctors.
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Afghanistan: Taliban member kills young girl after she rejected marriage proposal

The New India Express

By ANI

9 Nov 2022

Surprisingly, the Taliban government officials in the Balkh province acknowledged the incident and claimed that Mullah Yasin was detained and assured that he is in custody.

KABUL [Afghanistan]: Afghanistan’s Taliban security head killed a young girl in Balkh province after she rejected his marriage proposal, Khaama Press reported citing local sources.

The Taliban administration’s head of Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice in the Sholgara district of Balkh province, Mullah Yasin killed a young girl named Maryam after she rejected his marriage proposal.

Surprisingly, the Taliban government officials in the Balkh province acknowledged the incident and claimed that Mullah Yasin was detained and assured that he is in custody.

According to Mohammad Asif Waziri, the spokesperson for the Taliban chief of police in the province of Balkh, Maryam was the victim of a single murder by a department employee, reported Khaama Press.

The Taliban leader had previously told his people to decide on a path of action, think about their responsibilities, and refrain from having more than one wife, according to Khaama Press.

This occurs at a time when Taliban commanders are reported to have paid sizable dowries to their fathers-in-law in return for the hands of their daughters, and a Taliban commander recently transported his newlywed bride home on a military chopper belonging to the Afghan National Army, as per Khaama Press.

Ever since the Taliban took over Afghanistan, the plight of Afghan women has continued to be deplorable in the country.

Women’s lives have become worst under the Taliban’s regime. The girls were stopped from going to school beyond sixth grade on March 23 and a decree against the women’s dress code was issued after a month. There are restrictions on movement, education and freedom of expression of women posing a threat to their survival.

Not only this, the lack of female healthcare workers has prevented women from accessing basic medical facilities, and international donors, who fund 90 percent of health clinics, are hesitant to send money because of their fear of the funds being misused.

Around 80 percent of women working in the media have lost their jobs, and almost 18 million women in the country are struggling for health, education and social rights. Many women, particularly those who worked in security agencies, lost their jobs after the Islamic Emirate was re-established.

The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) released a report the previous month, outlining the human rights situation in Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover.

The report summarized UNAMA’s findings with regard to the protection of civilians, extrajudicial killings, torture and ill-treatment, arbitrary arrests and detentions, the rights of women and girls in Afghanistan, fundamental freedoms and the situation in places of detention. Amid this, the rehiring of women officers comes as a ray of hope for the women facing several severe challenges in the country.

Some female police forces urged the Islamic Emirate to allow more women to work in government institutions. “We ask the Islamic Emirate to let all the women return to their jobs,” said Mashoqa, a police officer.

Afghanistan: Taliban member kills young girl after she rejected marriage proposal
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Campaign Highlights Plight of High School Girls Kept From Kankor Exam

These students asked the Islamic Emirate to open secondary schools for girls so they can gain entrance for the upcoming Kankor exam.

A social media campaign has been launched under the name “Let Afghan Girls Learn.”

The organizer of the event said that its goal is to immediately open the gates of secondary and high schools for girls.

“This is a non-political campaign. The goal is to invite different guests for a week, both Afghans and foreigners, knowledgeable professors and any people who will discuss the opening of schools,” said Obaidullah Bahir, host of the campaign.

Some students said that due to the closing of schools for girls they have lost access to the Kankor exam and now their future is unknown. They said this year “thousands of girls were prevented from taking the Kankor Exam.”

These students asked the Islamic Emirate to open secondary schools for girls so they can gain entrance for the upcoming Kankor exam.

Nazanin is a 12th grade student and due to the closing of the schools for girls she could not participate in the Kankor exam, and she said that all her dreams to continue her education have turned into despair.

“We just want the school to be opened, we are worried about our future, we want the schools to be opened so that we can study,” said Nazanin, a student.

“The 11th grader who went to 12th is without a future, the 12th grader who is studying to prepare for Kankor is also unlucky,” said Lima, a student.

Some female students who are not allowed to go to school say they face depression.

“I request the Islamic Emirate to reopen the schools for girls as soon as possible because we want to be educated and to study and make our country progress,” said Arezo, a student.

However, the officials of the Ministry of Education did not provide a comment on the issue after repeated requests.

Meanwhile, some religious clerics said that depriving girls of school is against Islamic law.

“No one can say that from Islam, pertaining to girls, especially in Afghanistan–to the extent that we are in Afghanistan because we need our sisters to study–it is forbidden for them to go to school. I think that this is a strategic issue,” said Rahmatullah Norzai, professor of religious scholars.

At the same time, as girls’ schools are closed, the presence of women in higher education institutions and entrance exams have also decreased

Campaign Highlights Plight of High School Girls Kept From Kankor Exam
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MoPW: 65,000 Workers to Be Sent Abroad

Tolo News

7 Nov 2022

Meanwhile, some residents in Kabul who are unemployed asked the government to facilitate work opportunities for them.

The Ministry of Public Works said that 65 thousand workers will be sent abroad for work soon.

The deputy minister said that 15,000 will go to Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey to work with livestock.

“We are trying to provide facilities for these people. And we are trying to solve this problem as soon as possible and send our people to work abroad,” said Makhodm Sadat, The deputy minister of Public Works.

The deputy minister said that contracts to send Afghan workers to foreign countries were signed in the previous government, but their implementation was delayed due to various problems.

Meanwhile, some residents in Kabul who are unemployed asked the government to facilitate work opportunities for them.

“I have house rent, I have electricity, I have seven people who want food, but I don’t earn two hundred Afghani from morning to evening,” said Rahmatullah, a worker.

“Our request to the government is to not allow the youth to leave illegally. The government should help them and send them by legal means,” said Mustafa, a worker.

Economists believe that sending Afghan workers to foreign countries will have a good impact on the country’s economy.

“The journey of Afghans to other countries through the legal route leads to the establishment of relations, the establishment of diplomacy and also good achievements.  In other words, he sends money to his family and in this way economic development occurs,” said Mohammad Asif Nang, an economist.

The United Nations Development Agency expressed concern about the increasing unemployment in Afghanistan, and according to their statistics in one year 700,000 jobs have been lost in Afghanistan.

MoPW: 65,000 Workers to Be Sent Abroad
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Afghanistan Among Countries with Most Displaced People

Some Afghan families who have been displaced due to climate change said that they are deeply concerned as winter approaches.

UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said that over 70 percent of the world’s refugees and displaced people come from the most climate-vulnerable countries including Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Syria, and Yemen.

Grandi said that these countries “have an enormous stake in discussions about the climate crisis, but they are too often excluded.”

“Afghanistan is not on the agenda of COP27 and there is no official representative of Afghanistan in this conference. I attended as an unofficial representative,” said Abdul Hadi Achakzai, an unofficial representative of Afghanistan in the COP27.

Some Afghan families who have been displaced due to climate change said that they are deeply concerned as winter approaches.

Sharif is one of the displaced persons who came to Kabul from Parwan province due to floods that hit several parts of the province in August of this year.

TOLOnews interviewed some of the displaced people who are currently living in the Charai Qumber area of Kabul city.

“My children are starving and I am a widow,” she said.

“I am from Logar. When the floods flowed, we were displaced. I am a widow and poor,” said Sheerin, a displaced person.

“The flood hit our home and destroyed it. I have nothing here now,” said Basri Gul, a displaced person.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Refugee and Repatriation, Abdul Mutalib Haqqani, said that around 130,000 people have been displaced due to climate change.

“The number of people who are displaced due to natural disasters reached nearly 133,000,” he said.

Afghanistan Among Countries with Most Displaced People
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