By Janet Ekstract ISTANBUL-On February 19, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres headed up a two-day U.N.-sponsored meeting focusing on Afghanistan and its “evolving situation” where he made the case for ending restrictions imposed by Taliban de facto authorities on women and girls in Afghanistan. At a press conference in Doha, Qatar, for the meeting – the U.N. leader said he began consultations for a U.N. envoy for Afghanistan. Leaders and officials of more than 24 nations attended the meeting with Afghan participants with the exception of Taliban representatives. One of the meeting’s major goals is to weigh potential international engagement with Afghanistan where the U.N. chief held closed-door sessions with representatives of several nations and organizations on Monday. Taliban leaders rejected the invitation from the U.N. Department of Political Affairs and Peacebuilding (DPPA). Russia rejected sending any delegation to the meeting because it said it was acting “at the request of the Afghan authorities.” Russia added that it wouldn’t join “so-called Afghan civil activists, whose selection, by the way, was conducted non-transparently behind Kabul’s back.”
Meanwhile, a civil-society and women’s rights representative Mahbouba Seraj and other Afghan participants unaffiliated with the Taliban-led government told Radio Azadi that priorities up for discussion on the second day of the meeting includes the plight of women and girls under the Taliban. Ever since the Taliban reclaimed power after America withdrew its troops in August 2021, girls and women lost their freedom. Currently, girls who finished sixth grade are barred from attending school with university education and are banned from working in the nongovernmental sector. Work in most government organizations is off-limits women in Afghanistan. There are also numerous other restictions on women in the country as well. Seraj in a press conference said she hopes women’s voices will “finally be heard, that his issue will be followed up on, and indeed someone,” will take up the cause of Afghan women. She said Afghan women are discriminated against on a daily basis and they’re also isolated under a fundamentalist Taliban regime.
Photo : AA
