As members of the U.S. Policy Advocates for Afghan Women’s and Girls’ Rights Working Group, we deplore and strongly condemn the latest attacks on women’s rights in Afghanistan. The recent decrees banning women from working in non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and attending university constitute gender persecution and show willful disregard for the well-being of the Afghan people and the future of the country writ large.
...WASHINGTON DC Television WUSA9 features VOICE’S art exhibition — Home is Still A Long Way Away: An Art Exhibition by Afghan Women — while on display on the National Mall December 10-12, 2022.
...In August 2021, as the Taliban took over Kabul, the international community evacuated thousands of Afghan women human rights defenders whose lives were at risk. These women and their families were taken to countries such as Turkey, Greece, Albania, and Qatar while their resettlement processes began. More than a year later, many of them are still in transit. Many of their family members are still in Afghanistan; their friends and colleagues are dispersed around the world in search of safety and security; and their lives are seemingly on hold.
...New Report from VOICE! | November 17, 2022: Since the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan in August 2021, millions of women have been displaced within Afghanistan, and many have been forced to flee the country, watching while the Taliban regime progressively restricts women’s most basic human rights. While many WHRDs and their families were evacuated from Afghanistan immediately after the Taliban takeover due to heightened risks of gender-based violence and other forms of abuse, many others had no choice or decided to stay and live under significant threat as they continue their activism.
...A year after the Taliban’s takeover, Afghanistan has become ‘a cage for Afghan women,’ activist and VOICE country lead Yalda Royan says in an interview with Business Insider. A year ago, Yalda Royan lost everything: “my country, my home, my job, my people,” she told Insider. In exile, Royan continues to fight for the country she left behind as the country team lead for the feminist organization VOICE Amplified. She is also a founding member of the Afghan Women’s Advocacy Group who, in June, spoke before the United Nations’ Security Council, blasting “the negligence of the international community” in the face of Afghanistan’s new, misogynistic leadership, where despite early promises, young women and girls are still barred from receiving an education.
...The global humanitarian community is failing Afghan women and girls, and it will continue to fail them until it starts backing up its empty statements with real action and working directly with Afghan women, girls and women-led organizations to implement solutions to the crisis they face. After Afghan women spent two decades thinking they were part of a partnership with the U.S. and international community, to then be betrayed and left behind, it’s past time for the global community to listen to Afghan women and girls and empower them to drive solutions to this crisis.
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