Effect of Taliban in Afghanistan: Women disappearing from streets

Ground Report | New Delhi: Effect of Taliban in Afghanistan; Rights organizations and aid organizations are removing pictures of women beneficiaries, employees, and other local women from their websites after the Taliban took over Afghanistan on August 15.

"Our top priority is to ensure safety, and that includes the safety of our teams. The safety of the women and girls we are working with," says Mohamed Nasiri, UN Women's Director for Asia and the Pacific. "(The content) will be uploaded again once we are convinced. We will see what is happening on the ground," he said. He described the current situation in Afghanistan as a "gender emergency".

ALSO READ: LGBT community living in danger of death in Afghanistan

Removing content related to women

Nasiri said the move to remove the photos is temporary and does not mean the organization is abandoning Afghan women but is taking precautions as it seeks to ensure the Taliban's recent promises. Recently, the Taliban have made promises to protect women's rights.

ALSO READ: Former Afghan minister works as pizza delivery man in Germany

After America's attack in 2001, atrocities on women had stopped there. With the withdrawal of US-led foreign forces, the Taliban quickly gained a territorial edge, and the entire country is now under Taliban control. During the Taliban regime, women had to cover their bodies and faces with a burqa. They were denied education and not allowed to work. Women could not go out of the house without a male relative.

Women in their 20s grew up without Taliban rule, during which women achieved significant progress in Afghanistan. Girls go to school, women have become MPs and they are also in business. She also knows that these benefits are easy to reverse in a male-dominated and conservative society.

Some rights activists worry that the removal of photographs of women may inadvertently reinforce the ideology of removing women from public life, which was vigorously enforced during the Taliban's 1996–2001 rule.

Effect of Taliban in Afghanistan

But amid fears that any digital footprint could be used to target people. At least five international agencies have told the Thomson Reuters Foundation that they are removing images that identify Afghan women, children, and employees. An Oxfam spokesperson, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: "We are actively removing (content) as a precaution".

The charity reinstated a revised version of its Afghanistan page on Friday after the site went offline for some time last week, while UN Women replaced its local page with a statement that removed the country from its list of locations. removed where it operates.

Amnesty International said thousands of Afghans, including academics, journalists and activists, "are at serious risk of Taliban retaliation" as the Taliban seized power just a week ago. An Amnesty worker who did not wish to be named said several of his associates had gone into hiding.

You can connect with Ground Report on Facebook, Twitter, and Whatsapp, and mail us at [email protected] to send us your suggestions and writeups