RASC News Agency: The former Afghanistani Minister for Women’s Affairs and prominent women’s rights activist has criticized the global community’s actions and condemnations regarding the violation of women’s rights in Afghanistan, deeming them insufficient. Sima Samar, the former Minister for Women’s Affairs in Afghanistan, in an interview with “The Guardian”, described the international response to the gender apartheid unfolding in Afghanistan as inadequate and ineffective.
Samar highlighted that racial apartheid has been recognized as a crime against humanity under international law since 1973, stressing that a similar atrocity is now occurring against Afghanistani women and girls. This women’s rights advocate stated that under Taliban rule, Afghanistani women have been stripped of their fundamental rights, effectively imprisoned by the regime.
Previously, Roza Otunbayeva, the Head of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), reported that female prisoners in Afghanistan are being denied access to “legal services.” During her meeting with Mohammad Yousuf Mastari, the head of the Taliban’s Prison Administration, Otunbayeva underscored that the mass arrests and the issuance of long-term sentences by the Taliban’s judicial system pose significant challenges to ensuring “criminal justice” and maintaining adequate prison conditions in Afghanistan.
She warned that Afghanistani women, particularly those in prison, are being deprived of their basic human and civil rights. Recently, the Taliban enacted the “Vice and Virtue Law”, which imposes draconian restrictions on women. Under this law, women’s voices are even considered ‘awrah’ (indecent or shameful). Women are prohibited from entering markets, cities, or parks without a male guardian, and the law empowers authorities to discipline those who defy these mandates.
