The Taliban’s restriction on Afghan women working for the UN in Afghanistan has been universally denounced by the UN Security Council (UNSC), which has urged Taliban leaders to “swiftly reverse” an assault on the rights of women and girls.
The restriction is described as “unprecedented in the history of the United Nations” and as “undermining human rights and humanitarian principles” in the resolution, which was written by the United Arab Emirates and Japan. Additionally, “the indispensable role of women in Afghan society” is affirmed in the resolution.
More than 90 nations, including those “from Afghanistan’s immediate neighbourhood, from the Muslim world, and from all corners of the earth,” co-sponsored the resolution, according to Lana Nusseibeh, the UAE’s ambassador to the UN.
The world won’t watch helplessly while women in Afghanistan are marginalised from society, she said the UNSC. “This… support makes our fundamental message today even more significant,” she said.
The UNSC vote took place just days before an international conference on Afghanistan was set to take place in Doha on May 1-2. Special representatives on Afghanistan from several nations will meet behind closed doors with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to discuss a cohesive strategy for dealing with the Taliban.
“The Taliban’s orders are destroying Afghanistan forever,”
The Taliban stopped the majority of Afghan women from working for humanitarian relief organisations in December, and they only recently started enforcing their prohibition on women working for the UN. In addition to tightening restrictions on women’s participation in public life after ousting the Western-backed government in 2021, the group has also closed girls’ high schools and barred women from attending universities.
The Taliban claims that its rigorous interpretation of Islamic law respects women’s rights and that choices regarding female aid workers were a “internal issue.”
The Security Council decision acknowledges the necessity of addressing significant economic issues facing Afghanistan, including by utilising Central Bank of Afghanistan assets for the benefit of the Afghan people.
As of right now, all that has been observed is the movement of assets from one account to another; the Afghan people have not received even a single dollar in compensation, said Geng Shuang, China’s deputy UN ambassador.
Vassily Nebenzia, Russia’s ambassador to the UN, also demanded that the assets belonging to the Afghan Central Bank be returned.
