LAHORE: The panelists at the session on ‘the Impact of Talibanisation on Women in Afghanistan and Pakistan’ at the Asma Jahangir Conference 2021 on Saturday said a new society had emerged in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Afghanistan where cultural norms had been destroyed in the name of religion.

The session had Samina Ahmed as its moderator and Sima Samar, Mahbouba Seraj, Shaharzad Akbar, Shagufta Malik, Pashtana Durrani, Farzana Ali and Nader Nadery as panelists.

Samina Ahmed, the senior adviser at the International Crisis Group, said the humanitarian crises in Afghanistan since the fall of the Ghani government had hit the women and children hard. She said 60pc of the Afghan population was facing critical situation while facing the issues such as displacement, high level of poverty, hunger, violence and absence of the rule of law.

She termed the Taliban regime a total collapse as the insurgent group had no experience in tackling poverty and governance issues while some problems the regime was facing stemmed from its rigidity. For example, she added, the donors were ready to pay salary to teachers through their bank accounts if the Taliban lifted the ban on girl education. Similarly, cash could come to the health workers accounts if the Taliban allowed women to work but the Taliban only knew resolving problems with guns and not through talks, she lamented.

Shaharzad Akbar, the chairperson of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, while attending the session online, said the Taliban had not shifted from an insurgency group to a responsible government, which turned the situation dire. She bemoaned that targeted and extrajudicial killings were rampant in Afghanistan and there had been a complete closure of the public space under the Mullahs rule. In the previous years, Ms Akbar added, the women helped raise household income through jobs and businesses but not anymore. She asked Pakistan to play its role for emancipation of the Afghan women.

It was left to journalist Farzana Ali to recount horrific ordeals of the women of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. She said a mindset had been cultivated under the influence of the Taliban in parts of Pakistan, which devalued women and that mindset did not allow women to work and the girls to get education. She said when she joined journalism in 1997, the biggest hurdles to her work were the social norms while after 2007, religious norms emerged, which not only hindered her work but also put her life at risk. She said she had interviewed the wives of the militants and they were not normal human beings.

Sima Samar, the former minister of women’s affairs of Afghanistan, said the destruction of education system had wreaked havoc in Afghanistan.

“This has been done since the invasion of the Russians who tried to impose their own system.”

Ms Samar said the Taliban rule had reduced the status of women and destroyed human dignity and founding principles.

Mahbouba Seraj, the founder of the Afghan Women’s Network, said it was sad to see wonderful people were leaving Afghanistan since the inception of the Taliban rule because of fear and anxiety. She asked the neighbouring countries – Iran and Pakistan – to help Afghan people and warned them against using Afghanistan for their strategic benefits.

Awami National Party MPA Shagufta Malik said that since 2008, girl education had been the main target of the militants in Afghanistan. She said things were so bleak now that a rape victim was told to wear burka to avoid such incidents instead of providing her with justice.

Published in Dawn, November 21st, 2021