RASC News Agency: Local sources confirmed on Wednesday, 15th Dalw, that members of the Taliban’s so-called “Ministry of Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice” (Amr bil Maroof wa Nahi anil Munkar) arrested three barbers in the center of Bamyan province for allegedly cutting hair in “Western styles” and transferred them to the provincial central prison.
This action aligns with the Taliban’s coercive policies aimed at imposing an ideological interpretation of culture and lifestyle on Afghanistan’s society a policy that, according to human rights organizations, clearly constitutes repression of individual freedoms and violation of the right to personal choice.
According to the Taliban, the three barbers had previously received warnings to refrain from Western-style haircuts. However, such “directives” are not based on civil law but rather on strict, arbitrary interpretations of Sharia, a practice criticized by international bodies, including the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights, as part of a systematic suppression of cultural and social freedoms in Afghanistan.
These arrests continue a wave of cultural restrictions imposed by the Taliban since returning to power from bans on music and cinema to limitations on clothing, personal grooming, lifestyle, and artistic activities. Human rights experts emphasize that such coercive measures are part of the Taliban’s attempt to control citizens’ bodies, identities, and ways of life through fear and punishment.
International organizations have repeatedly warned that the Taliban’s Ministry of Promotion of Virtue has effectively become a policing tool to suppress civil society, arresting, threatening, and punishing individuals without transparent judicial processes. Analysts say this has turned Afghanistan into a society where even the simplest expressions of daily life can be treated as “ideological crimes.”
