The last three years have seen the Taliban placing restrictions on all aspects of women’s lives in Afghanistan. From education to employment. From movement to participation in everyday activities. When the international community thought that it could not get any worse for women in Afghanistan, the Taliban kept coming up with new ways how to impose more restrictions on women. In August 2024, the Taliban published its new law to “promote virtue and eliminate vice” that sets up rules for everyday life and adds to the litany of restrictions on women. Article 13 of the law made it mandatory for a woman to veil her body at all times in public. A face covering was said to be essential. This was to avoid temptation and tempting others. Women are to cover themselves in front of non-Muslim males and females. By virtue of the law, a woman’s voice is deemed intimate, and as such, women are not to be heard singing, reciting, or reading aloud in public. Women are not allowed to look at men they are not related to by blood or marriage and vice versa. However, it did not stop there.
In December 2024, the Taliban introduced a new directive prohibiting women and girls from attending public and private medical institutes in Afghanistan. The news comes at a time when Afghanistan is facing a staggering humanitarian crisis, maternal mortality rates are at the lowest in recent years, more than 33% of Afghans lack access to health services and malnutrition rates are alarmingly high and rising. As emphasized by Tom Fletcher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Afghanistan is the second largest humanitarian crisis in the world, after only Sudan. Commenting on the new directive, Under-Secretary-General Fletcher pointed out that “barring Afghan women from attending public and private medical institutes would likely lead to a dramatic increase in rates of antenatal, neonatal and maternal mortality, as it would prevent more than 36,000 midwives and 2,800 nurses from entering the workforce in the next few years.”
End of December 2024, the Taliban’s supreme leader issued an order banning the construction of windows overlooking areas used by Afghan women. Existing windows were to be blocked. Other decrees include a warning that organizations that employ women would have their operating licenses revoked, and a ban on female artisans from participating in a handicraft exhibition in Kandahar.
As women in Afghanistan have been effectively separated, segregated and removed from the public square, locking them in the vicious circle of gender apartheid, the international community must identify the best ways to address this treatment of women with unapologetic steps. In 2024, several states initiated important legal steps to engage the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
On November 28, 2024, six State Parties, namely, Chile, Costa Rica, Spain, France, Luxembourg, and Mexico referred the Situation in the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (Situation in Afghanistan) to the ICC. In the referral, the States Parties express their concern about the severe deterioration of the human rights situation in Afghanistan, especially for women and girls, and request the Office of the Prosecutor (OTP) to consider the crimes committed against women and girls after the Taliban takeover in 2021. In December 2024, the Chief Prosecutor of the ICC confirmed that further steps would be taken in the case.
On September 25, 2024, Australia, Canada, Germany, and the Kingdom of the Netherlands announced that they had formally taken steps to call on Afghanistan to cease its violations of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). This is the first and key step before officially filing proceedings with the ICJ. According to CEDAW, if the dispute is not settled by negotiation, it should be submitted to arbitration. If within six months from the date of the request for arbitration, the parties are unable to agree on the organization of the arbitration, the dispute can be then referred to the ICJ.
Other steps must be taken to ensure that the gender apartheid women and girls in Afghanistan are subjected to is addressed through all possible avenues. Looking away cannot be accepted.