Taliban Abuses Continue; Afghan Women Fight Back

In late 2001, Afghan women were at the forefront of global agendas, fueled by a mix of media coverage, humanitarian intervention, and military operations. Calls for “liberating” Afghan women were widespread. As of August 2021, the U.S. had spent two decades and over $780 million to promote women’s rights in Afghanistan. Now these rights have been stripped away, and any gains — however tenuous — now appear lost.

First, let us be clear: Afghan women have always been actively liberating themselves. And they continue to do so now. Afghan women are the ones who led underground schools during the Taliban’s first reign from 1996 to 2001 — risking their own lives to educate their girls. They used their chaddaris as tools for feminist activism, smuggling cameras in order to film and expose the abuses of the Taliban to the world. Afghan women have always had a strong voice, but they have always been an underutilized force. If they lead, Afghanistan will have peace. A peace without women is not real peace — not in Afghanistan, or anywhere.

Today, Afghan women are resisting yet again.

In my first book on women in Afghanistan, published in 2009, I explained that women, politics, and the state have always been intertwined in Afghanistan, and conflicts have been fueled by attempts to challenge or change women’s status. It appears that we have come full circle since, 20 years later in late 2021, Afghanistan fell to the Taliban once more.

Afghanistan consistently ranks among the worst countries in the world in terms of gender equality. In fact, the World Economic Forum ranks Afghanistan as one of the worst places to be a woman, the Women, Peace, and Security Index places Afghanistan 170 out of 170, and the latest Global Gender Gap Index ranks Afghanistan 156 out of 156. There is no doubt that the situation for women in Afghanistan is dire.

Throughout Afghan history, women’s rights can be characterized by incremental progress followed by rapid regress. The speed and extent to which women’s rights have been stripped away with the Taliban’s re-takeover is a stark reminder of this fact. Since the Taliban reclaimed control just nine months ago, they have appointed a men-only administration; abolished the Ministry of Women’s Affairs; banned women from most paid employment; restricted women’s movement; and closed most girls’ secondary schools while also creating barriers to women and girls pursuing higher education. And that barely scratches the surface of restrictions imposed. In short, the regime is actively attempting to erase Afghan women and girls.

In addition to a humanitarian crisis, Afghanistan faces a human rights crisis. Women have reported increased instances of violence deliberately targeting women and girls. The situation is now worse than ever, especially after the Taliban dismantled already-scant gender-based violence support systems. The situation is rooted in deep structural and long-standing challenges that have been exacerbated and institutionalized by the Taliban. Afghanistan’s deeply patriarchal society has meant violence against women — in particular domestic violence — has always been widespread. According to the Afghan Ministry of Women’s Affairs’ 2016 strategy on eliminating violence against women, more than half of all Afghan women reported experiencing at least one type of physical, sexual, or psychological violence, and more than 60 percent were married without their consent.

Yet Afghan women are resisting. “Inaction simply isn’t an option,” an Afghan friend told me back in 2001, “Nor is hopelessness.” And the same sentiment holds true today. Afghan women continue risking their lives so that girls can go to school and women are protected from violent partners. Afghan women refuse to be silenced, even in the face of backlash. In a September 2021 article in The Guardian, Afghan reporter Zahra Joya said, “The Taliban can use their guns and their rules to try to break the spirit of Afghan women, but they cannot silence us all. I will never stop resisting.” Afghan civil society is filled with women’s groups started by everyday women galvanized into action such as Afghan Women’s Network, Afghan Women’s Resource Center, Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan, MyRedLine, and many others. These organizations provide services for women and girls, work to champion women’s rights, and raise international awareness of human rights abuses in Afghanistan. Increasingly looking to the younger generation who did not live under the Taliban also proves hopeful for many activists. Shukriya Barakzai, a former member of parliament who also served as Afghanistan’s ambassador to Norway, pointed out how the youth “are full of energy, hope, and dreams … they’re more alert. They’re communicating with the world.”

The Taliban has been steadily shrinking civil society space and erasing women from public life. Among many other violations, there have been targeted attempts to silence female journalists, and women’s rights protestors have been beaten and abducted. Violent responses have forced women activists to sometimes operate covertly by using encrypted phones, dressing as men, and staying in safe houses — but they are adamant they will never stop raising their voices.

Many women have been prevented from returning to work and, with women making up more than a quarter of the 400,000 civil servants in Afghanistan, it is estimated such measures could immediately cost the Afghan economy up to US$1 billion. Clearly, there will be no recovery without the full inclusion and participation of women.

These restrictions on women’s employment and participation in public life prompted women to take to the streets in protest, risking beatings or arrest. When an all-male interim Taliban government was formed in September 2021, women protested across Kabul, Badakhshan, and Herat saying they would not accept a government with no women ministers. Even though the protests were met with violence, women were not deterred. Protests continued across the country in the following months, and Afghan women took to various media channels to raise awareness. In the words of one protestor: “We want the Taliban to know that they cannot eliminate us from society.”

Many prominent women politicians have had to flee, yet they continue advocating and resisting. In January, Afghan women’s rights activists met with Taliban representatives to talk about the worsening economic and humanitarian situation. As well as calling for the reopening of schools and the release of female activists who are imprisoned, they urged the Taliban to stop violating human rights. The women’s rights activists in attendance, however, find no reason to trust the Taliban and have little hope anything will change, given the Taliban’s track record.

It is estimated that almost 4 million Afghan children are out of school, more than half of them girls. Hundreds of thousands of teachers have gone unpaid for almost six months. Girls’ schools were set to reopen March 23, but this never materialized, proving the Taliban had not changed. In response, women and girls organized a rally near the Taliban’s Ministry of Education in Kabul with protestors chanting “Education is our right — open the doors of girls’ schools!” One study showed that the economic impact of educating a girl in Afghanistan is more than double that of educating a boy.

An Afghan charity called PenPath is one such example of organizations fighting back. PenPath — fueled by thousands of volunteers — has provided 57,000 children with access to education by opening hundreds of schools, building libraries, and providing literacy classes at home for girls. Zarlasht Wali, an English teacher with PenPath, spoke about the decision to continue their work despite the increased threats to their safety: “I have decided to stand up for our education. If girls can’t go to school, we will go to them and hold classes in their homes.” PenPath’s founder, Mutiullah Wesa, plans to continue fighting alongside women and girls for their right to education with countrywide protests — the most recent of which took place April 11, where female volunteers asked leaders to reopen schools.

Information about the closure of girls’ schools was widely shared on social media, and while the international community condemned the Taliban, lack of a coordinated response could lead to yet more inertia. The situation presents an opportunity for the international community to have a real impact on women’s rights and learn from the mistakes of the past. Insufficient action by the U.S. will result in “devastation” for Afghan women and girls and “cause the U.S. to lose credibility on the global stage, risk a resurgence of threats to the U.S. from terrorists, and accelerate the drug trade that finances the Taliban,” Sima Samar, former deputy president and minister of women’s affairs, wrote in August 2021. This is a critical juncture for the international community to act urgently. Donors need to hold the Taliban to their commitments to respect women’s rights; governments need to push for human rights monitoring to be able to function and work freely in the country; and sanctions should be imposed on Taliban leaders in the form of travel bans and economic sanctions.

The international community should make education and women’s rights a sticking point in negotiations. Any engagement with the Taliban needs to have the precondition of reopening schools — at the very least. Any future negotiations should also include civil society movements — and women. Addressing the United Nations Security Council meeting in January, activist Mahbouba Seraj said:

“While it feels as though the world has given up on Afghan women, we have not. We are in the streets protesting every day, despite the threats, weapons, and the violence. … But we need your political support and resources to succeed. We need you to stand by us, and ensure that Afghan women are equal partners in any decision-making regarding the future of Afghanistan.”

In 2022, I published my second book on Afghanistan, in which I argued the international rhetoric of “liberation” is still problematic, as it denies women’s agency and sidelines Afghan women. I recall an Afghan man who told me: “The world thought they could bring freedom to Afghan women, but freedom is only won from the inside.” Masooda, an Afghan woman, described it to me as such:

We brought our own freedom, our own liberation. Yes, the international community helped, but we Afghan women have always been helping ourselves, much more than anyone has been able to help us. But now, what happens? We are back to zero, it seems. But it is not zero. We know freedom. We know how to fight for freedom. And foreigners can finally help us in that fight for freedom. Listen to us. We know what we need, and we know what freedom we want.

With or without support, Afghan women do what they always have been doing — resisting.