Women, victims of the "policies of inequality" in Taliban Afghanistan

MADRID, 15 Ago. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Taliban promised to respect the rights achieved by women after the overthrow of the Islamic Emirate in 2001. A year later, it is already clear that all these commitments have fallen on deaf ears and UN Women accuses the current rulers of "meticulously" building " policies of inequality" that marginalize half of the population.

The executive director of this agency, Sima Bahous, perceives a "daily and continuous" deterioration of the Human Rights of women and girls, both in the public and even in the private sphere. There are no women in the Taliban cabinet, where the 'hardline' men continue to rule and adopt laws to suit them.

"It has been a year of growing disrespect for the right (of women) to live their lives as free and equal, denying them the opportunity to earn a living, access health care and education, and escape situations of violence," she says. Bahous on the first anniversary of the Taliban's rise to power.

In "only a few months", she adds, the radicals overturned decades of progress, something that is periodically recalled by groups of women who continue to take to the streets to claim their rights despite the threats of the current rulers. On Saturday, the Taliban dispersed a protest in Kabul with about 40 women, according to the BBC.

Women have suffered setbacks in the workplace, but also in education, to the point that Afghanistan is, today, the only country in the world that prevents girls from accessing secondary education. Some 3.4 million girls and adolescents are outside the educational system, according to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF).

Mariya, 16, claims in statements to UNICEF her "right" to return to class and finish the three years she has left in secondary school. "Some of my friends and classmates suffer from depression," says this young woman, who acknowledges that with the Taliban the difference between genders has increased.

The Taliban have also issued orders that force women to cover their faces in public or to always move under the supervision of a male 'guardian', which from the inside can translate into a greater situation of violence and the inability of women victims of gender-based violence to ask for help.

The United Nations fears that this will also lead to an increase in forced marriages, in a context in which the proportion of girls who marry before the age of 18 is already around 28 percent.

"We must continue to raise the voices of Afghan women and girls who fight every day for their rights. Their fight is our fight. What happens to them is a global responsibility," says Bahous, who calls on the Taliban to consider the marginalization of women as a national "self-sabotage".

Without the full participation of women, he warns, "there are few opportunities to achieve lasting peace, stability and economic development", in a context in which more than 24 million Afghans need humanitarian aid. Afghanistan is considered one of the biggest crises in the world.