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Delegates taking part in an emergency debate at the UN Human Rights Council on the status of women and girls in Afghanistan are urging the international community to put maximum pressure on the Taliban.
In opening Friday’s debate, UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet accused the Taliban of systematically oppressing and excluding women and girls from public life in Afghanistan.
She told the rights council that domestic violence and harassment have increased under Taliban rule, as have attacks on human rights defenders, journalists and lawyers. She said that women can no longer find work and that secondary education for more than a million girls has ended.
She said an increasing number of restrictions on movement and clothing have plunged women into a deep depression.
“While some of these concerns preceded the Taliban takeover in August 2021, reforms at the time were moving in the right direction. There were improvements and hopes,Bachelet said. “However, since the Taliban took power, women and girls are experiencing the most significant and rapid return to the enjoyment of their rights across the board in decades.”
The special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Afghanistan, Richard Bennett, said that the degradation of women’s rights is central to the Taliban’s ideology. Under Taliban rule in the 1990s, he noted, there was a marked regression in the rights of women and girls.
‘Misogyny and Oppression’
“Therefore, it should come as no surprise that, despite public assurances from the Taliban that they would respect the rights of women and girls, they are gradually reinstating the discrimination against women and girls that characterized their previous mandate and that is unparalleled in global level in misogyny and its oppression,” he said.
In an impassioned speech to the council, the first female deputy speaker of the Afghan parliament, Fawzia Koofi, described the dire situation among Afghan women. She said that women no longer participate in parliament, civic or public life. She said that every day one or two women commit suicide because they have no hope left.
“Afghanistan is the only country in the world where women are basically literally invisible – second class to their citizens,” she said. “In the 21st century, it’s heartbreaking. It is painful for me and for my sisters and other fellow citizens to defend our basic rights – the right to be visible, the right not to be erased from public life.”
The United Nations does not recognize the Taliban as Afghanistan’s legitimate rulers, and the group has no right to speak at any UN forum. The Afghan ambassador of the previous government spoke and basically confirmed what the other participants had to say.
As the debate continued, 3,000 Islamic clerics were gathering in the Loya Jirga, or grand council assembly, since the Taliban took over Afghanistan. Only men are present at the rally, called to discuss national unity and the issues facing the country. Taliban officials say the male delegates represent the women./VOA
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