The pomp and show thrown across the first anniversary celebrations of the Taliban\u2019s return to power in Kabul did little to address the regime\u2019s painful, almost fatal isolation in the international community. And it did their government no good at all that the last headline to come out of the country before the anniversary parade was about a violent government crackdown on protesting women who asked for nothing more than their most basic rights. No doubt those ladies, just like the rest of the world, were counting on the Taliban to keep their word, in peace talks just ahead of the US withdrawal, that women and minority rights would be protected; unlike the last time, they ran Kabul.
\nBut they didn\u2019t honour their promise. And not only did they keep the same old restrictions in place for both women as well as ethnic, religious and political minorities, but they are also tightening the screws all the time. Their latest condition for Sharia compliance is the restriction on females to travel large distances without male companions. On top of putting them out of school and out of work, they\u2019re now unable to travel, which is not going to wash with foreign countries that the Taliban are counting on for recognition and desperately needed financial aid.
\nOne would have thought that the utter misery caused by recent natural disasters, when the country was left with no money to help those in need, would have pressed upon the Taliban the need to engage with the rest of the world. But now it is clear that nothing, not even the needless, merciless suffering of their people, suffices to make them change their minds. All they have to do is begin compliance with the conditions that they themselves signed on just before storming back to Kabul, but they\u2019re not ready to do it because of issues of their own. It also says a lot that terrorist organisations like ISIS continue to operate from that country and America\u2019s target killing of former al Qaeda chief Ayman al Zawahiri adds yet another layer of complications.
\nIf nobody has yet come close to recognizing the Taliban regime, it\u2019s chiefly because they want it this way. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The pomp and show thrown across the first anniversary celebrations of the Taliban\u2019s return to power in Kabul did little to address the regime\u2019s painful, almost fatal isolation in the international community. And it did their government no good at all that the last headline to come out of the country before the anniversary parade […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[10146],"class_list":{"0":"post-277676","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-editorial","7":"tag-taliban-anniversary"},"yoast_head":"\n