Ozhai Jalalzai
After takeover of Afghanistan on 15 August, the Taliban promised nationwide “General Amnesty” to be respected and allowing all expects of society including women to generate, but they didn’t fulfill as was told, many people including women and girls were harmed, harassed, and banned from schools. No member of acting cabinet is a women and Afghan Women think they are not represented in the current government.
“We created a list of 150 women of influence who were mostly on death lists, who were facing tremendous risks and were willing to take any risk in the process of accessing the airport or exiting the country,” says Melissa co-founder Nadina Christopoulou to Aljazeera.
Women have equal rights as other human beings and their basic rights should be respected, they should enjoy their rights for quality education, work, and other activities. They should be protected against target raids and attacks.
“Today, it is precisely those women who broke from the traditional path who are most endangered. Many have gone into hiding. Hundreds have taken to the streets, protesting the regime, only to be met by the brute force of rifle butts and sticks. Others fled.” New York Times wrote on September 20.
Forty years of war have threatened and affected the lives of Afghan women as they suffer more and more. However, women are not involved in armed conflicts, wars and other armed struggles but they carry on mor burden as their husbands, sons, brothers and other relatives die.
The current situation is glooming us more and we still don’t know either to be able to get education, to go office or carry on other activities. The international community, civil society and media outlets should pay more attention to women’s right, because many people don’t want to lose the achievements they have gained in past 20 years.
According to Rescue.org, “Women and children are increasingly bearing the brunt of the violence and make up around half of all civilian casualties. They continue to be at risk of targeted attacks. Afghanistan has been the deadliest place for children for the past six years.”
Target killings, searching for ex-employees and ex officials is underway and “general amnesty” doesn’t matter to many Taliban members, the basic rights of women and girls are simply ignored and day by day the current government puts more restrictions and harsh policies, many reports tell us how the Taliban response by harsh way the rallies organized by women across the county.
According to bookings.edu, “These women have consistently spoken out against Taliban abuses and strongly oppose any return to political arrangements that would significantly weaken the rights of Afghan women.”
We, Afghan women want the support of the international community to do more for equal rights, girls and women education and work and raise our voice for a better life.
Many believe the international community has betrayed us and already left Afghan women alone, as we see many leading female politicians and figures left the country since mid-August but tens thousand others are still in Afghanistan and fighting for their rights in front of the armed Taliban, who don’t believe in these principles.
The Taliban and their operatives or other fundamentalist groups still control war torn Afghanistan and imposing their style of laws.
Violence and discrimination against women continue in the country where economic collapse is imminent, people are hopeless, and a dark picture of the future is emerging.
In past 20 years the governments were not able to eliminate the violence against women and there was not any solid policy to pave the way for a better life to Afghan women, we heard lots of slogans, many offices were operating in the country, but they couldn’t change mindset of the people especially in rural area.
The situation for Afghan women rights was not changed much and several activists want a comprehensive policy to guarantee women’s rights and end the violence against them.
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