High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell Fontelles, has met some Afghan women activists in Brussels ahead of the Afghan Women Leaders’ Forum in the capital city of Belgium.
The EU’s high representative said that he had a “substantive discussion” with the Afghan women activists on the need to ensure an “inclusive political process” in Afghanistan. According to him, an inclusive political process is needed where women and girls have equal opportunities and human rights are respected.
The Afghan Women Leaders’ Forum is set to be launched today at the EU’s headquarters in Brussels.
EU’s Special Envoy for Afghanistan, Tomas Niklasson, also said in a tweet that he will join the Forum with the EU’s Ambassador for Gender and Diversity, Stella Ronner-Grubačić.
According to Niklasson, participants will also join the meeting remotely from Afghanistan, North America, and Europe.
This comes as women in Afghanistan are facing a pressing situation and restrictive Taliban policies. In addition to imposing severe restrictions, the Taliban have effectively banned girls above 6th grade from schooling for more than a year.
The ruling group has so far violently suppressed women’s protests and imprisoned women rights activists. In the latest case, the Taliban arrested Zarifa Yaqobi, a women’s rights activist, and four male attendees from a press conference on November 03 in Kabul. There is no update about them and their whereabouts as yet.
