Richard Bennett, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on human rights in Afghanistan, met with Afghanistan’s refugees in Turkey to discuss the human rights situation in the country.
Bennett said in a post on X on Friday that he met with “diverse groups of resilient Afghan women and men who fled their country.” He also met with government officials and United Nations entities in Turkey.
On Saturday, Bennett met with a group of civil society members in Germany, who called on him to amplify the voices of Afghanistan’s women. The participants emphasized that the situation in Afghanistan is “not a domestic issue, it is a global concern and responsibility.”
In a joint report with the UN Working Group in June, Bennett highlighted the dire situation of human rights under the Taliban, particularly the widespread and systematic discrimination against women and girls.
The report documented that between September 2021 and May 2023, the Taliban imposed 50 draconian edicts against women and girls, including banning women’s education and employment and curbing their mobility, appearance, and rights to civic participation, among other things.
In a briefing to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on June 19, Bennett said, “grave, systematic, and institutionalized discrimination against women and girls is at the heart of Taliban ideology and rule, which also gives rise to concerns that they may be responsible for gender apartheid.”
