The Women Who Refuse to Be Silenced in Taliban-Ruled Afghanistan

The recent protests in Afghanistan’s Herat city against the women’s dress code earlier this month has left the whole world in shock. The United Nations has condemned the violence and urged the Taliban government to respect basic human rights of female citizens.

While political tensions and human right violations in Afghanistan have been a flashpoint since 2021 but information about ground realities has been scarce as it is pretty isolated in its rule. The little access to truth about the struggle of women is shown through the covert journalism done by women as an act of resistance against the Taliban decrees.

According to the reports of Kabul Now, representatives of 41 UN member states have condemned the Taliban’s “systematic oppression and discrimination against women and girls in Afghanistan” urging stronger international backing for accountability mechanisms.

In a joint statement delivered to the 62nd session of the UN human rights council, the countries said the Taliban’s treatment of women and girls violates principles of international law. Afghan’s representative in Geneva, Nazir Ahmad Andisha presented the statement on their behalf.

For the 5th consecutive year, girls have been deprived of education while women face bans on work, health care access, public life, civic participation and humanitarian aid. The UN cited arbitrary arrests, harassment by the moral police, censorship and violence as tools of repression.

The Taliban decree 12 normalizes domestic violence while decree 18 permits child marriage. After regaining power after the withdrawal of foreign forces, the Taliban has imposed restrictions on women, including bans on secondary and university education, limits on travel without a male guardian and prohibitions on working in many sectors, including most non government organizations. The Taliban have also dismantled institutions aimed at protecting women and replaced the former Ministry of Women’s Affairs with the Ministry for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice.

According to UN women’s research and analysis undertaken since August 2021, education and employment bans have sidelined a generation with nearly 80% of young women excluded from education, employment or training. Women’s representation in decision making has disappeared entirely though inheritance rights remain a narrow entry point. Finding cuts are further constraining women led organizations, jeopardizing the few remaining civic spaces.

In the article published by Atlantic Council, Sara, which is a pseudonym as her name is being withheld for security reasons, shared insights on their fight and the pain they endure because of it. Protesting was a way used by many women like Sara, who said that when the Taliban first arrived four years ago, she joined a protest outside her office.

The next day, her manager told her that “Having you here is too much of a risk, it's better you find another place to work”. Unemployment only added to her struggles. She had to relocate numerous times due to the Taliban threats to harm her and her family and they moved between neighbourhoods and districts throughout Kabul and several times heading to other provinces.

During one of their first protests against the mandatory Hijab order, they were attacked by the Taliban. The protest descended into chaos as they met with gunfire and beatings. They were eventually detained with other women, captive to Taliban military officials who had no respect for their dignity and rights or any law. They were kept for hours in the severe heat subjected to humiliating, hateful insults by their captors.

After hours of physical and psychological torture, the Taliban officials forced them to pledge that they would no longer participate in protests. Followed by this incident when Taliban militarized their streets, they took their resistance indoors.

Writing, chanting and singing “Bread, Work and Freedom”, so that their voices, criminalized by the Taliban, could awaken the world’s conscience. Many of them began running underground schools, some registered online through art and others began secretly documenting the Taliban’s oppression in the hope of one day holding the group accountable by bringing cases against the Taliban at the international criminal court and the international court of Justice, codifying gender apartheid as a crime against humanity under international law or through international mechanism. She documented recordings of Taliban decrees and abuses along with the personal experiences behind them, to preserve the truth and ensure that victim’s voices are not silenced.

Newsroom in Exile

“I cannot carry my phone with me because it has messages and emails from my editors, so I take my mother’s phone” says an Afghan journalist who goes by the pseudonym Sana Atef. “Even receiving my salary is tricky because I can’t use formal banking channels,” she adds.

Atef, who lives in southern Afghanistan, works for Zan Times, a women-led newsroom in exile that reports on human violations in Taliban controlled Afghanistan. She reports and documents the Taliban’s abuses and the impact of their restrictive laws on girls, women and LGBTQ+ people in Afghanistan.

“My colleagues and I go through so many struggles, but it feels worth it when we see these stories come out in the world. Through our work, people get to know about the erasure of basic rights for women in Afghanistan”, she added.

Nader built a small network of women journalists in Afghanistan and those in exile. Atef is one of them. She began by reaching out to some women she had interviewed in her previous reporting and asking them to write for Zan Times.

To ensure the safety of their team, Zan Times uses pseudonyms for their on the ground reporters, none of whom know each other’s real identities. They collaborate with international newsrooms including The Guardian, The Fuller Project, Women’s eNews, The Indian Express and Lighthouse Reports to ensure their reporting reaches people globally.

This article is written by Radha Pallavi Marturi, a student of Central University of Andhra Pradesh, interning with Deccan Chronicle.