By Zuhal Salim
On April 4, 2024, women’s rights activist Manizha Seddiqi appeared on TOLOnews and delivered a coerced statement. Manizha had been forcibly disappeared the previous October and was later found in Taliban custody. Contrary to her statement denying ill-treatment, Amnesty International confirmed that she had been deprived of family visits, legal representation, and medical care.
Manizha, however, did not express regret, even in a coerced statement, for protesting against the Taliban. “If my crime is participating in the protest, [then] I have already spent six months in prison for that.” She stated defiantly.
Manizha’s resolve and that of thousands of girls and women across Afghanistan and abroad to oppose the regime’s systematic anti-women policies signal the emergence of a resilient and united women’s movement. Three years on, the Taliban’s war on women and their relentless campaign of gender persecution has failed to break the spirit of women of Afghanistan. They are still protesting in smaller groups and mostly in private spaces. For instance, on March 8, a group of women in Takhar and Balkh marked International Women’s Day by staging an anti-Taliban protest. In another example, in June 2024, a group of women protested the Taliban’s drastic salary cuts for female state employees.
Over the last three years, they have defied the Taliban in different ways. They have confronted the regime’s morality police on the streets despite imminent dangers to their safety and dignity, as seen in the viral videos and photos of their protests. Education hasn’t been silenced either. Women have transitioned to e-learning platforms inside and outside the country to surpass the regime’s ban on education. Sola, an all-girls boarding school established in Kabul by a prominent education activist, Shabana Basij-Rasikh, is now functioning in exile in Rwanda, providing in-person and online classes for girls.
Creativity has also become a weapon. The Last Torch, a clandestine singing duo, defied the Taliban by singing songs of resistance while veiled in burqas. This powerful irony speaks volumes about women’s resilience in Afghanistan. Lastly, women of Afghanistan refuse to be sidelined in conversations about the future of their country. Last month, three prominent women refused to take part in a UN-organized meeting in Doha with the Taliban, protesting the exclusion of women’s rights and issues from the main agenda.
Empowered through solidarity and sisterhood, Afghanistan’s women understand what it means to live under the Taliban and suffer from the totality of a Jihadist regime that categorically denies the legal, political, and social existence of women as independent human beings and citizens. They know there is no hope or future for them in a Taliban-governed Afghanistan. Therefore, undeterred by an enemy that brags about “defeating” the West, women of Afghanistan are finding ways and means to beat the Taliban in their pursuit of subduing women. .
Afghanistan women’s movement has gained an unprecedented level of intellectual maturity and political dynamism capable of articulating its demands and aspirations about the country’s future. This newfound momentum is manifested in the breadth and depth of the political and policy discussions and literature they produced and their capacity for effective political mobilization. This profound paradigm shift rightly invalidates the narratives and stereotypes produced about women of Afghanistan, mainly by the institutions of policy and knowledge production in the West, that for so long have portrayed them as voiceless victims who lack agency and are in constant need of a white liberator and spokesperson. The invincible spirit and conviction to oppose the Taliban’s tribal and religious misogyny has given the women a new identity, one that demands respect and dignity in its own right.
The promising part of this fight is that it is led by a cohort of young women in a country that, according to the United Nations Population Fund, has one of the youngest and fastest-growing populations in the world—with approximately 63 percent of the people below 25 years of age. Given the history of Afghanistan’s conflict and its multifaceted fragility as a state and society, one should not take youth power lightly.
As the world grapples with the political and security consequences of the Taliban’s illegal return to power, the demands of Afghanistan’s women’s movement must be recognized and centered in discussions about Afghanistan. The international community has a moral obligation to put women’s rights first in any debates about the country. In practical terms, it means listening to Afghanistan’s women, working with them, and involving them, from conception to implementation, in any political initiative that impacts their lives and conditions and their country’s future.
The dangerous precedent set by the latest round of UN-led Doha talks, in which the UN and almost every other international player yielded to the Taliban’s demands, should be reversed. The UN and other international institutions must demonstrably commit to taking the issue of women’s representation seriously. They need to broaden their agenda on Afghanistan and diversify the list of their women invitees to encompass all views and perspectives, including the dissenting voices critical of the Taliban lobby in the West.
It is not just a moral imperative but a strategic necessity to support Afghanistan’s women’s movement in their fight against the Taliban. To truly support their civil and political resistance, the world must provide women-led organizations, alliances, and groups with the essential tools for success: technical expertise to amplify their voices and navigate complex political landscapes, political platforms to advocate for their rights on a global stage, and financial resources to sustain their vital work inside the country. By investing in the courageous women of Afghanistan, the world will invest in a future for Afghanistan where every individual, regardless of gender, can live a life of dignity, opportunity, and freedom.
Zuhal Salim is the Program Manager for Women’s Economic Power at Upwardly Global, a workforce development organization in the US. She was previously a diplomat in Afghanistan’s Permanent Mission to the UN in New York where her work focused on women, peace and security.
