Women in Afghanistan 1996-2001
© Moira Richards
In 1996, one of the gangs of warmongers in Afghanistan managed to get control of the capital, Kabul - and government by the Taliban began.
All the women were ordered to cover themselves from head to toe if they went out in public. One woman, who was 5 months pregnant, bared her face on the streets. She was beaten so severely by a soldier, that she miscarried her baby, and she subsequently died. T
he country has a special Department for the Prevention of Vice and the Fostering of Virtue. It meted out a punishment of 100 lashes to a teenaged girl who was walking with a man, not her relative. A woman was publicly chastised by a guard because he deemed the fabric of her socks to be too thin. In 1997, five women were flogged in public because they did not conform to the prescribed dress code. Others were punished for associating with foreigners, even though the government had issued them with work-permits to do so.
In 1998 doctors were ordered to refuse treatment to any woman who was not accompanied by a husband, father or grown son. In Kabul alone, it is estimated that 30 000 women are widows, many of whom have no such close male relative to take her to get medical care.
One woman, who could not afford to buy the head-to-toe burqa that she must wear in public, was not able to take her sick daughter to a clinic for treatment, and she had to watch her die at home. Even an eight-year-old child was beaten by the police because she was playing outside without a burqa on.
Afghani women have been forbidden to work outside their homes. A journalist, who is the sole breadwinner for her kids, has been threatened with death because she continues to work. The country's many thousands of war widows have no option but to go out on the streets and beg for money to feed their kids - or to send their kids out to beg for food. Many of the women who live under these restrictions, suffer severe depression and the suicide rate among the women of this country has increased dramatically over the last five years.
Women and men must ride in separate buses. Women are not allowed to drive (bicycles, cars, anything), so the bus drivers are all men, who must ensure that their female passengers have no contact with them.
All the women were ordered to cover themselves from head to toe if they went out in public. One woman, who was 5 months pregnant, bared her face on the streets. She was beaten so severely by a soldier, that she miscarried her baby, and she subsequently died. T
he country has a special Department for the Prevention of Vice and the Fostering of Virtue. It meted out a punishment of 100 lashes to a teenaged girl who was walking with a man, not her relative. A woman was publicly chastised by a guard because he deemed the fabric of her socks to be too thin. In 1997, five women were flogged in public because they did not conform to the prescribed dress code. Others were punished for associating with foreigners, even though the government had issued them with work-permits to do so.
In 1998 doctors were ordered to refuse treatment to any woman who was not accompanied by a husband, father or grown son. In Kabul alone, it is estimated that 30 000 women are widows, many of whom have no such close male relative to take her to get medical care.
One woman, who could not afford to buy the head-to-toe burqa that she must wear in public, was not able to take her sick daughter to a clinic for treatment, and she had to watch her die at home. Even an eight-year-old child was beaten by the police because she was playing outside without a burqa on.
Afghani women have been forbidden to work outside their homes. A journalist, who is the sole breadwinner for her kids, has been threatened with death because she continues to work. The country's many thousands of war widows have no option but to go out on the streets and beg for money to feed their kids - or to send their kids out to beg for food. Many of the women who live under these restrictions, suffer severe depression and the suicide rate among the women of this country has increased dramatically over the last five years.
Women and men must ride in separate buses. Women are not allowed to drive (bicycles, cars, anything), so the bus drivers are all men, who must ensure that their female passengers have no contact with them.
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