Afghanistan’s Taliban order girls to cowl up head to toe

Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers on Saturday ordered all Afghan girls to put on head-to-toe clothes in public — a pointy, hard-line pivot that confirmed the worst fears of rights activists and was sure to additional complicate Taliban dealings with an already distrustful worldwide neighborhood.

The decree says that girls ought to depart the house solely when vital, and that male kin would face punishment — beginning with a summons and escalating as much as courtroom hearings and jail time — for girls’s gown code violations.

It was the newest in a sequence of repressive edicts issued by the Taliban management, not all of which have been applied. Last month, for instance, the Taliban forbade girls to journey alone, however after a day of opposition, that has since been silently ignored.

On Sunday within the capital, Kabul, many ladies on the road have been carrying the identical giant shawls as earlier than. Women additionally arrived unaccompanied at Kabul International Airport, whereas within the metropolis girls boarded small buses alone.

The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan mentioned it was deeply involved with what seemed to be a proper directive that may be applied and enforced, including that it might search clarifications from the Taliban in regards to the resolution.

“This decision contradicts numerous assurances regarding respect for and protection of all Afghans’ human rights, including those of women and girls, that had been provided to the international community by Taliban representatives during discussions and negotiations over the past decade,” it mentioned in a press release.

The decree, which calls for girls to solely present their eyes and recommends they put on the head-to-toe burqa, evoked related restrictions on girls throughout the Taliban’s earlier rule between 1996 and 2001.

“We want our sisters to live with dignity and safety,” mentioned Khalid Hanafi, performing minister for the Taliban’s vice and advantage ministry.

The Taliban beforehand determined towards reopening faculties to ladies above grade 6, reneging on an earlier promise and opting to appease their hard-line base on the expense of additional alienating the worldwide neighborhood. But this decree doesn’t have widespread help amongst a management that’s divided between pragmatists and the hard-liners.

That resolution disrupted efforts by the Taliban to win recognition from potential worldwide donors at a time when the nation is mired in a worsening humanitarian disaster.

“For all dignified Afghan women wearing Hijab is necessary and the best Hijab is chadori (the head-to-toe burqa) which is part of our tradition and is respectful,” mentioned Shir Mohammad, an official from the vice and advantage ministry in a press release.

“Those women who are not too old or young must cover their face, except the eyes,” he mentioned. “Islamic principles and Islamic ideology are more important to us than anything else.”

Senior Afghanistan researcher Heather Barr of Human Rights Watch urged the worldwide neighborhood to place coordinated strain on the Taliban.

“(It is) far past time for a serious and strategic response to the Taliban’s escalating assault on women’s rights,” she wrote on Twitter.

The Taliban have been ousted in 2001 by a U.S.-led coalition for harboring al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden and returned to energy within the waning days of America’s chaotic departure final yr.

The White House National Security Council condemned the Taliban’s Saturday decree and urged them to reverse it.

“We are discussing this with other countries and partners. The legitimacy and support that the Taliban seeks from the international community depend entirely on their conduct, specifically their ability to back stated commitments with actions,” it mentioned in a press release.

Since taking energy final August, the Taliban management has been squabbling amongst themselves as they battle to transition from struggle to governing. It has pit hard-liners towards the extra pragmatic amongst them.

A spokeswoman from Pangea, an Italian non-governmental group that has assisted girls for years in Afghanistan, mentioned the brand new decree could be notably troublesome for them to swallow since they’d lived in relative freedom till the Taliban takeover.

“In the last 20 years, they have had the awareness of human rights, and in the span of a few months have lost them,” Silvia Redigolo mentioned by phone. “It’s dramatic to (now) have a life that doesn’t exist.”

Infuriating many Afghans is the information that lots of the Taliban of the youthful era, like Sirajuddin Haqqani, are educating their women in Pakistan, whereas in Afghanistan girls and women have been focused by their repressive edicts since taking energy. Haqqani is a U.N.-designated terrorist and head of the Haqqani community, which has been blamed for a number of the deadliest assaults throughout the 20-year U.S.-led invasion.

Girls have been banned from faculty past grade 6 in a lot of the nation for the reason that Taliban’s return. Universities opened earlier this yr in a lot of the nation, however since taking energy the Taliban edicts have been erratic. While a handful of provinces continued to supply training to all, most provinces closed academic establishments for women and girls.

The religiously pushed Taliban administration fears that going ahead with enrolling women past the the sixth grade may alienate their rural base, Hashmi mentioned.

In Kabul, personal faculties and universities have operated uninterrupted.