The Taliban increases its restrictions on Afghan women

The Taliban government has tightened restrictions on women and girls in Afghanistan in recent months, particularly with regard to their continuing education and other jobs, according to a UN report on the human rights situation released on Monday.

The list of prohibited items is expanding

The United Nations Mission in Afghanistan said in the report, which covers the months of May and June, that the Taliban Ministry of Public Health announced that only males would be allowed to take the tests to pursue specialized medical studies.

This came in the wake of imposing a ban on female medical students from taking graduation exams in February, and banning women from entering universities last December, according to the report.

Prohibition of movement and jobs

The United Nations indicated that it had recorded cases in which the Taliban imposed previously announced restrictions on women’s freedom of movement and jobs.

The report said that in early May, two Afghan female employees working for an international non-governmental organization were arrested by Taliban forces at an airport because they had traveled without a male relative.

In June, a midwife was detained and interrogated for five hours by the Taliban intelligence service, who threatened to kill her if she continued her work with an NGO. The report said she resigned two days later as a result.

discontinuing licenses

“The Ministry of Economy suspended the licensing of two other non-governmental organizations because of the presence of female employees in their offices,” the organization said.

There were also reports of physical assaults against women, including an incident in which members of the Taliban Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice beat a woman with a stick and forced her to leave a public park, she said.

Despite its initial promises of more moderate rule than it was during the period of its ascension to power in the 1990s, the Taliban have imposed strict measures since they took control of the capabilities of matters in Afghanistan in August of 2021, with the withdrawal of US and NATO forces. .

oppression of women

The movement’s leaders banned women from engaging in most areas of public life and work, suppressed media freedoms, prevented girls from attending school beyond the sixth grade, and banned Afghan women from working in local and non-governmental organizations.

That ban was extended last April to include United Nations organizations.

The measures sparked a major international uproar, increasing the country’s isolation at a time when its economy is collapsing and its humanitarian crisis is exacerbating.

During the first Taliban rule in 1996-2001, officials carried out corporal punishment and executions of those convicted of crimes, mostly in sports stadiums.

The second public execution

And last June, the Taliban carried out what is believed to be their second public execution since returning to power.

The first was carried out last December, when a man was executed by gunfire for the murder of another man.

His father executed him

The victim’s father carried out the death sentence with an assault rifle, in the western province of Farah, in front of hundreds of onlookers and several senior Taliban officials.

The second sentence was carried out against a man in the capital, Kabul, after he was convicted of killing five people last year.

The United Nations said last May that 274 men, 58 women and two boys had been flogged in public over the previous six months.