Zabihullah Mujahid: Afghan women should stay at home

A Taliban spokesman has asked Afghan women not to appear in public for now because the militants have not yet received sufficient training and cannot be guaranteed to treat women well. Is this an implicit threat or an endorsement of the Islamists' misogyny?

A clear shift in the Taliban's stance on women, after varying and moderate claims in the early days. The Taliban spokesman called on Afghan women to stay at home to protect themselves from potential dangers. Zabihullah Mujahid cited the reason for the call as "preventing abuse" and the inexperience of the militants in dealing with women.

The New York Times quoted the spokesman as saying: "Our forces are new and have not received much training. We are concerned that they will harass women and, God forbid, harm them."

These remarks, which could be seen as a threat to women and an endorsement of the Taliban's violence, are in stark contrast to previous claims by the Islamists that women should not worry about jobs or education and would have the right to leave the house alone.

Zabihullah Mujahid, who was introduced as the Taliban's Minister of Culture, announced in his first press conference that women's rights, education, work, and economic activity would be respected within the framework of Sharia.

During the five-year Taliban rule in Afghanistan between 1996 and 2001, women were deprived of education or social and economic participation, and for any social activity, they were required to have a male companion, even a boy, by their side.

Currently, women in Kabul are still walking alone and without the burqa, and girls' schools in various provinces are still open. Zabihullah Mujahid has emphasized that women's stay-at-home orders are temporary and supportive, but his explicit advice could be a confirmation of skepticism and pessimism about the Taliban's change of approach. They have claimed to have reconsidered their previous policies, but there is much evidence to dampen optimism in this regard.

The Taliban have assured Afghan women that they will not harm them, but few have forgotten their dark record. The Taliban's record contains a long list of dos and don'ts for women and girls. Going to school, working, listening to music, wearing sandals, and leaving the house without a man are among the prohibitions. Forced marriage, wearing the burqa, public flogging, and stoning are also among the regulations.

Reviewing previous events in Afghanistan, Human Rights Watch noted that during the previous Taliban rule in the country, they also asked women to stay at home until the situation improved, but it quickly became clear that this was a consistent approach to excluding women from society.

“They were saying back then that women were in danger outside the home, and the justification was that women shouldn’t be harmed. This time, you can be sure that the situation the Islamists want will never come to pass,” Heather Barr, women’s director at Human Rights Watch, told the New York Times.

At the same time, Zabihullah Mujahid, the spokesman for the Taliban's political office in Qatar, while claiming to respect women's rights, told Anadolu Agency: "Women have the right to education, employment, property, and the right to choose their own lives. But the situation will not improve in a day or two. We want time."

Mohammad Naeem Wardak added that the “occupiers’” efforts to change the beliefs and traditions of the Afghan people over the past 20 years have failed and that the Taliban will govern the country based on Islam. “In the Islamic world, there is no single and specific way in terms of managing and practicing Islam, elections or other ways are not the goal but the means,” he was quoted as saying by Anadolu Agency.

Previously, senior Taliban commander Wahidullah Hashimi told Reuters that the status of women and their civil and legal rights in the future would be determined and clarified by the Council of Religious Scholars: "Ultimatums should decide on women's education or employment. They should say whether girls can go to school or what their clothing should be."

Source: DW