Adila Ayoub Hakimi
August 15 holds a solemn place in the collective memory of the Afghan people as a symbol of state collapse, the onset of darkness, and the failure of the international conscience. On this day, a fundamentalist, misogynistic, and anti-human group used force to reassert its control over the fate of a nation. This moment marks one of the darkest chapters in contemporary Afghan history. It was not only a political collapse but the destruction of half a century of women’s struggle for freedom, equality, and human dignity – a disintegration of core human rights and values.
The Taliban, a group born out of regional and international intelligence projects, assumed power on August 15, 2021 through the humiliating surrender of Kabul. As with the group’s origin, the Taliban’s return to power was sealed by agreements among global powers, rather than the Afghan people’s will.
The result was the total erasure of Afghan women, who are not only denied education, political participation, and civil engagement but stripped of the basic right to exist in society. The Taliban formally and completely deny the social and individual presence of Afghan women.
United Nations reports, including those by Richard Bennett, the U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in Afghanistan, have documented systematic, organized violence against women: arbitrary arrests, imprisonment, torture, gang rape, forced marriages, and targeted killings are all weapons in the deliberate silencing of Afghan women.
The Taliban’s hostility toward education, especially women’s education, is neither accidental nor superficial; it is a fundamental pillar of their ideology. Since their inception, the Taliban have viewed education not as a human right but as a threat to their political, ethnic, and religious dominance.
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