As the Taliban close in on Kabul, women inside the city are getting ready for what may be coming. Think of women in Afghanistan now, and you'll probably recall pictures in the media of women in full-body burqas, perhaps the famous 'National Geographic photograph of the Afghan girl'. Throughout the changing political landscape of Afghanistan in the last fifty years, women's rights have been exploited by different groups for political gain, sometimes being improved but often being abused.
Until the conflict of the 1970s, the 20th Century had seen relatively steady progression for women's rights in the country. Afghan women were first eligible to vote in 1919 - only a year after women in the UK were given voting rights, and a year before the women in the United States were allowed to vote. In the 1950s purdah (gendered separation) was abolished; in the 1960s a new constitution brought equality to many areas of life, including political participation.
But during coups and Soviet occupation in the 1970s, through civil conflict between Mujahideen groups and government forces in the '80s and '90s, and then under Taliban rule, women in Afghanistan had their rights increasingly rolled back. After the fall of the Taliban in 2001, even though many continued to choose to wear the burqa in adherence to religious and traditional beliefs, its rejection by millions of others across the country became a symbol of a new dawn for the country’s women, who were able to dictate what they wore for themselves again.
In Kabul, a sense of grief and panic has overwhelmed women in the Afghan capital. With two-thirds of the population under the age of 30, most women here have never lived under Taliban control. It is not just the burqa which they fear. It is the ban on education, work, leaving the house without a male chaperone, showing their skin in public, accessing healthcare delivered by men (with women forbidden from working, healthcare will be virtually inaccessible) and being involved in politics or speaking publicly. Under the Taliban, failure to comply with these bans results in public flogging, beating and stoning, rape and violence against women and girls will be rife.
As US and UK forces abandon the country, they take with them any hope for the future of women. Who will come to their rescue?
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