Afghan women fear arrest, harassment and further punishment whenever a new Taliban decree is announced. Police enforcement has increased harassment in public spaces and further limited women\u2019s ability to leave their homes, according to testimony from 745 Afghan women participating in the latest survey by UN Women, International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the UN\u2019s Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA).
\nThe new study follows recent reports of the arbitrary and severe enforcement of the hijab decree, particularly in Kabul, the agencies said \u2013 which began publishing quarterly consultations with diverse Afghan women a year after the Taliban took power in August 2021. Since then, the Taliban authorities have introduced more than 50 decrees that directly curtail the rights and dignity of women, Friday\u2019s report states. Consultations took place between 27 January and 8 February, with UN Women, IOM and UNAMA gathering views online and in-person \u2013 where it was safe to do so \u2013 and via group sessions and individual telesurveys. The agencies were able to reach women across all of Afghanistan\u2019s 34 provinces, according to the report. Participants were asked to give views on the period from October to December 2023, it was pointed out.The results show that women fear arrest and the long-lasting stigma and shame associated with being taken into police custody, the report stated. In addition, over half of women \u2013 57 per cent \u2013 felt unsafe leaving the house without a mahram. Risks to their security and their anxiety levels increased whenever a new decree was announced specifically targeting them. Only one per cent of women indicated that they had \u201cgood\u201d or \u201cfull\u201d influence on decision-making at the community level, a major decrease from 17 per cent in January 2023. A lack of any safe public space for women to gather and share views and experiences, build communities and engage on issues they considered important left them \u201cwithout a pathway to participate in or influence decision making\u201d, the report said. Women\u2019s self-reported \u201cgood\u201d or \u201cfull\u201d influence over household decisions has drastically decreased from 90 per cent in January 2023 to just 32 per cent this January.
\nThey continued to link their lack of rights, educational prospects and jobs, to declining influence at home, the report found. The women also outlined the intergenerational and gendered impact of the de facto authorities\u2019 restrictions and the accompanying conservative shifts in social attitudes towards children. Some respondents said boys appeared to be internalizing the social and political subordination of their mothers and sisters, reinforcing a belief that they should remain in the home in a position of servitude. Meanwhile, girls\u2019 perceptions of their prospects were changing their values and understanding of their future and potential, the findings showed.
\nThirty-two per cent of respondents stated that international recognition of the Taliban authorities should happen only after reversing all restrictions, while 25 per cent of them said it should follow the reversal of some specific bans and 28 per cent said that recognition should not happen at all, under any circumstances. In July 2023, a similar question found that 96 per cent of women maintained that recognition should only occur after improvements in women\u2019s rights or that it should not occur at all. Some respondents expressed deep disappointment with some UN Member States who in their efforts to engage the Taliban, were overlooking the severity of what is an unprecedented women\u2019s rights crisis and the associated violations of international law, based on treaties ratified by previous Afghan governments. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Afghan women fear arrest, harassment and further punishment whenever a new Taliban decree is announced. Police enforcement has increased harassment in public spaces and further limited women\u2019s ability to leave their homes, according to testimony from 745 Afghan women participating in the latest survey by UN Women, International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the UN\u2019s […]<\/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":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-389559","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-editorial"},"yoast_head":"\n