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THE BELOW
When one hurts or kills a women
one hurts or kills hummanity and is an antrocitie.
Gino d'Artali
and: My mother (1931-1997) always said to me <Mi
figlio, non esistono notizie <vecchie> perche puoi imparare qualcosa da
qualsiasi notizia.> Translated: <My son, there is no such thing as so
called 'old' news because you can learn something from any news.>
Gianna d'Artali
The Guardian
21 Feb 2022
Global development is supported by
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
By Lizzy Davies
<<Kabul to California: how the ‘hip-hop family’ mobilised for young
Afghans. With breakdancers, artists and parkourists facing a bleak
future under the Taliban, a global network stepped in to help, drawing
on the activist spirit of rap culture. A veteran of the hip-hop scene
and internationally celebrated breakdancer, Nancy Yu – AKA Asia One –
has her fair share of people contacting her looking for advice. But the
message she received in 2019 from a young Afghan was a little different.
Frustrated by his breakdancing crew’s inability to get visas to perform
internationally, Moshtagh* was wondering if Asia could help. <He felt
they were really good, but they felt, like, invisible to the world,> she
says. <I liked him. He wasn’t trying to bug me or say ‘we need this
right now’ … He seemed rather humble and honest.> Over the months, a
friendship grew between Kabul and California, based on mutual respect
and an appreciation of hip-hop culture. Moshtagh, who is in his 20s,
felt he had a lot to learn from Asia, a one-time member of the Rock
Steady Crew who set up the B-Boy summit, a global gathering celebrating
all the elements of hip-hop: breakdancing, DJ-ing, rapping and graffiti.
Only once has her belief in Moshtagh’s humility been severely challenged:
when he declared, with youthful bravado, that he could be better than
Tupac Shakur. <I was, like, ‘you’re out of your mind’,> Asia laughs.
Last year, as the Taliban made sweeping gains across Afghanistan and
even the modest freedoms enjoyed by many young people in Kabul started
to feel in doubt, Moshtagh’s messages became more serious and urgent.
And in the summer, as the Taliban took the capital, came the decision:
the hip-hoppers, he told Asia, were leaving. It was a decision <based on
complete fear>, says Asia. <You know, just that overwhelming sense of
survival, that ‘if we don’t leave now, we don’t know what’s going to
happen to us. And so we’re gonna risk our chance’. Because … they felt
so threatened by the Taliban based on their western practices.> >>
Read more here:
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2022/feb/21/were-all-hip-hop-family-the-artists-fighting-to-get-afghan-breakdancers-to-safety?utm_term=62166efa4003de35d127f76b6b194d03&utm_campaign=GlobalDispatch&utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&CMP=globaldispatch_email
Al Jazeera
21 Feb 2022
<<UNICEF to pay stipend to Afghan teachers as ’emergency support’
With salaries unpaid for months due to an enormous economic crisis, the
UN agency says it would pay teachers for at least two months.
The United Nations children’s agency says it will pay Afghan teachers a
monthly stipend for at least two months. Salaries have been unpaid for
months as the country plunged into economic crisis due to sanctions
imposed by some Western governments on the Taliban administration. The
stipends of roughly $100 per month will be funded by the European Union
and will be paid – in Afghanis – to some 194,000 primary and secondary
school teachers for January and February, UNICEF said in a statement on
Sunday. <Following months of uncertainty and hardship for many teachers,
we are pleased to extend emergency support to public school teachers in
Afghanistan who have spared no effort to keep children learning,> said
Mohamed Ayoya, the representative for UNICEF Afghanistan. The country
has been in economic crisis since the Taliban took over last August as
foreign forces withdrew. Restrictions on the banking sector due to
sanctions and a drop-off in development funding left the new
administration struggling to pay many public sector salaries, including
for teachers. The international community has been grappling with how to
engage with the Taliban without formally recognising their government,
and has made education for girls a key demand when speaking with the
group, according to diplomats.
The Taliban has been vague on their plans for girls’ education; many of
them are still unable to attend secondary school in many provinces.>>
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/21/unicef-stipend-afghanistan-teachers-emergency-support
The Guardian
20 Feb 2022
By Patrick Wintour Diplomatic editor
<<West has inflicted catastrophic damage on Afghanistan, says David
Miliband. The west has inflicted catastrophic damage on Afghanistan and
its own reputation by imposing a policy of starvation on the country,
according to David Miliband, the former UK foreign secretary and chief
executive of the International Rescue Committee. <If we wanted to create
a failed state we could not have a more effective policy mix than the
one we have at the moment,> he told the Guardian. Taliban fighters at
the Hazrat-e-Ali shrine in Mazar-i-Sharif in December 2021. Miliband has
been at the forefront of those lobbying the Biden administration and the
World Bank to release cash not only for humanitarian aid but also to
start reconstructing the economy. <I simply do not understand the lack
of urgency to get this thing moving. It genuinely befuddles me that we
should have allowed this to get so much worse so quickly,> he said. He
warned the crisis was so deep that the UN’s appeal for $4bn this year,
due to be addressed at a pledging conference next month, was likely to
rise to $10bn next year. There are reports that the World Bank board may
meet in March to release as much as £1bn that it has so far refused to
release. On his first visit to London in two years, he said: <What we
are doing is not making it worse for the Taliban, it is making it worse
for the people. We are not punishing the Taliban. It is ordinary Afghans
that are paying the price of peace. It is not just a catastrophe of
choice, but a catastrophe of reputation. This is a starvation policy.>
>>
Read more here:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/20/west-catastrophic-damage-afghanistan-taliban-david-miliband
Read also an embedded artictle by
Ghaith Abdul-Ahad
<<The long read
‘Whatever horrors they do, they do in secret’: inside the Taliban’s
return to power> >>
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2022/feb/17/inside-taliban-return-to-power-afghanistan-mazar-i-sherif
Al Jazeera
20 Feb 2022
By Sara Perria
<<In remote Bamiyan, a school run by an Afghan woman offers hope. The
school, set up by a university graduate, runs for two hours daily,
offering opportunity to an impoverished community.
Bamiyan, Afghanistan – It’s 6am and Freshta is sweeping the floor of her
makeshift cave school in Bamiyan province of Afghanistan.
Donkeys descend the orange-dirt hills of her timeless village to fetch
water, while cave homes awake to the smell of freshly baked flatbread.
Up to 50 children, most of them girls, attend the informal school – not
far from where historic giant Buddha statues were blown up by the
Taliban 20 years ago. The school runs for two hours daily in the morning
offering an opportunity to the impoverished community at a time the
country has been facing an unprecedented humanitarian crisis. <The
community suggested gathering the children and teaching them basic
English, Dari, maths, geography and the holy Quran,> Freshta, who only
gave one name, told Al Jazeera. <It became something bigger, year after
year,> the 22-year-old, who started the school at the age of 12, said,
adding that students, ranging from ages four to 17, mostly come from the
cave village of 50 families. Taliban return to power Freshta said she
was scared after the Taliban armed group returned to power in August.
The last time the Afghan group was in power between 1996-2001, it banned
women from education and jobs. <My school was lovely and colourful, but
when the Taliban took over Bamiyan I was very scared and my friends
suggested I take down all the posters and drawings on the walls. They
thought I was in danger, especially because I taught girls,> Freshta
said. <I put all the colours and pens in a plastic bag and threw it in
the river Patablaghman,> Freshta, wearing a coloured headscarf, said. <They
[Taliban fighters] came three times,> she added, <looking for my
neighbour who used to work for the local police, but he’d already fled.
I was afraid, but they didn’t seem to know about my school.>
Freshta is the only teacher and her work is voluntary. She sometimes
received donations from occasional visitors from the capital Kabul, but
the school has survived thanks to her hard work. <People here have
economic problems, they are either farmers or are unemployed and the
school is completely free,> she said. <These families wouldn’t be able
to afford a private school, and government schools are far.> >>
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/20/hidden-away-from-taliban-a-school-cave-continues-to-teach-kids
BBC News
INCL. PIC
18 Feb 2022
<<Five Afghan women who refuse to be silenced.
By Quentin Sommerville.
It was just a snowman. But as winter descended on a starving Afghan
population, the heavy snow brought joy to a small corner of Kabul.
A group of young women had stopped next to the snowman to take selfies.
As they giggled and looked at their phones, they could have been
anywhere. Then three Taliban fighters spotted them. They came closer -
the women fled. With a smile, one stepped towards the snowman - which
perhaps he thought was un-Islamic. He tore off the stick arms, carefully
removed the stone eyes, the nose too. Finally, a swift beheading. I had
just arrived back in Kabul after 10 years away and had already been
lectured by a member of the Taliban about my lack of understanding of
Afghan culture. He claimed to know what was best for Afghan women. <Blue-eyed
devils> (Westerners) had corrupted the country, he appeared to suggest.
Rather than take his word for it, I wanted to hear from women themselves.
Many are in hiding, all fear for their future and some for their lives.
There are still women on the streets of Kabul, some still in Western
clothes and headscarves, but their freedom is under attack - the freedom
to work, study, move freely and to lead independent lives. I met women
who had been forced into the shadows of a new Afghanistan, who took
great risks to express their views freely. They could only do so
anonymously - except for Fatima, who insisted on showing her face.>>
Note from Gino d'Artali: It's a long article but their stories must be
read:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-fa29260a-3c38-44f0-99cd-e680aed7ee14
Al Jazeera
Feb 14 2022
<<Gulf envoys stress women’s rights in meeting with Taliban FM
Ambassadors from Gulf countries meet with Foreign Minister Amir Khan
Muttaqi as he seeks funding to tackle a dire humanitarian crisis.
Ambassadors from Gulf states have underscored the need to guarantee
Afghan women’s rights to work and study as they met with their Taliban
counterpart in the Qatari capital, Doha. Meeting on Monday with Afghan
Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi, diplomats from the six-nation Gulf
Cooperation Council (GCC) stressed the necessity of a national
reconciliation plan that <respects basic freedoms and rights, including
women’s right to work and education>, read a statement from the bloc.
The Taliban tweeted pictures of the smiling foreign minister entering
Monday’s meeting with representatives from Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar,
Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. But diplomats said no
promises were made by Afghan officials inside. The Taliban, which seized
power in Afghanistan in August of last year and toppled a Western-backed
government, is urgently seeking to unfreeze billions of dollars of
assets abroad and get sanctions lifted as it struggles to cope with a
dire humanitarian crisis. Late January, United Nations Secretary-General
Antonio Guterres said that more than half of all Afghans face “extreme
levels of hunger <with “some families selling their babies to purchase
food>. But Western powers have linked the release of humanitarian aid to
the improvements of human rights, especially the ones of women. While
the Taliban promised a softer version of the harsh rule that
characterised its first stint in power from 1996 to 2001, provincial
authorities have imposed several restrictions on women, issuing regular
guidelines on how they should live.>>
Note by Gino d'Artali: No country has yet recognised the Taliban
government.
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/14/gulf-diplomats-urge-taliban-to-respect-womens-rights
The Guardian
14 Feb 2022
By Lois Beckett in Los Angeles
<<The Taliban forced Afghan TV workers into hiding. Now they’re asking
Hollywood for help. For nearly two decades, Afghanistan’s TV industry
developed popular hits, from medical shows and family dramas to Afghan
Star, a music competition based on American Idol.
Now, nearly six months after the Taliban seized control, many Afghan
television and film workers are jobless and in hiding. Some feel
abandoned by TV and entertainment industry workers in other countries. A
handful of former international colleagues have been fighting to get
them to safety, and they say they desperately need more support. (All
the names of Afghan TV workers have been changed for this article.)
Rahima, a screenwriter, said she was in the middle of teaching a
university class when she learned that the Taliban had entered Kabul.
She and a female colleague ran out to buy burkas, only to find the shops
already closed. She went home and locked herself inside. She has stayed
in hiding for the past five and a half months, she said. <In our
neighborhood, everyone recognizes me as a woman activist, the university
teacher and TV employee,> Rahima said through a translator. Other former
media workers described rushing to scrub their Facebook profiles and
concealing or throwing out anything in their house that would link them
to the entertainment industry. <They’re hiding their cameras, mics, and
booms, every single thing,> said Farjaad, a longtime TV producer based
in Kabul. One film-maker friend buried her camera <in the earth, like a
grave>, he said.>>
Read more here:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/13/afghan-tv-workers-taliban-hollywood
The Guardian
Emma Graham-Harrison in Qalat
10 Feb 2022
‘We have never given up’: how Afghan women are demanding their education
under the Taliban. Since recapturing Afghanistan, the Taliban have
largely if inconsistently closed down girls’ schooling – but have found
a new generation ready to fight for the right to study. When the Taliban
reached Parveen Tokhi’s home province of Zabul in mid-August and asked
to use her school as a temporary barracks, the headteacher was
frightened but clear about what she had to do. She spent the bleak years
of the first Taliban government in the 1990s stuck at home like almost
all Afghan women, barred from education and work. She was determined
that the same shadow wouldn’t engulf another generation. <I said: ‘OK,
you can stay there overnight, but these buildings are a girls’ school,
and I have sacrificed all my life for the education of these girls.’>
The men had to be out in time for morning classes to start as usual at
Bibi Khala school the next day, she insisted, undaunted by their guns.
Then she got the contact number for senior Taliban officials and rang
them directly to say there was no Islamic justification to bar girls
from the classrooms and corridors where she had spent most of her life,
first as a student, then for four decades as a teacher. <I said: ‘I will
not close the school, even if someone kills me for this, because the
girls come in hijab, and the teachers are female.’> Southern Zabul
province, where Tokhi teaches, is so deeply conservative that even under
the previous government only three girls’ high schools operated, all
clustered in the provincial capital, Qalat. Girls in rural areas ended
their education at sixth grade, if they got one at all.
It was not an obvious place for a pioneering experiment in Taliban
education policy. But to the surprise of many, in Zabul and beyond, the
new Taliban officials agreed to let all girls carry on with their
classes after making a few compromises. Girls must now wear <hijab> – by
which the Taliban mean the burqa – when they travel to and from school,
while the handful of male teachers at the site have been sacked and
primary school classes for boys once held on the same site have been
moved. <The women came here [to the education department offices] and
demanded that they should continue their education, and we decided to
allow them,> said Muhammad Usman Huriyat, Zabul’s education director.
The Taliban recognise the importance of girls’ education, and want to
train more women doctors, he said. <We are all responsible for this. We
know about human rights, the need of the people.> >>
Read more here:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/10/we-have-never-given-up-how-afghan-women-are-demanding-their-education-under-the-taliban
Al Jazeera
9 Feb 2022
<<WHO chief, Taliban discuss ‘dire’ Afghan health crisis
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus met the Taliban health minister who is part
of Taliban delegation currently visiting Switzerland.
The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday he had
met the health minister in the Taliban-led government in Afghanistan for
talks on the <dire> health and humanitarian crisis in the country. WHO
chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus revealed that he met Qalander Ebad for
talks on Tuesday. Ebad is part of a Taliban delegation visiting Geneva
for a week of talks with institutions and non-governmental agencies on
humanitarian access and human rights, as Afghanistan’s new rulers expand
their international engagement. The Taliban movement returned to power
in Kabul in mid-August as the United States ended its 20-year war in
Afghanistan. Since then, Afghanistan has plunged into financial chaos,
with inflation and unemployment surging, while the halting of aid and US
sanctions has triggered a humanitarian crisis in a country already
devastated by decades of war. Tedros had already met Ebad during his
visit to Kabul in September 2021 in the wake of the Taliban takeover.
<Despite some improvements since then, the health situation in
Afghanistan is still dire and the acute humanitarian crisis is
continuing to put lives at risk,> Tedros said.
He said they discussed health needs in the country, strengthening the
system, emergency preparedness and training the health workforce, in
which women are central. <The acute need in Afghanistan is to deliver
diagnostics to detect the COVID-19 virus, and in particular Omicron, as
the number of cases is on the rise,> Tedros said.
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/9/who-chief-taliban-discuss-dire-afghan-health-crisis
Al Jazeera
9 Feb 2022
<<Humanitarian aid on agenda as Taliban officials land in Geneva
The delegation from Afghanistan’s new rulers is due to hold talks with
the Red Cross and other non-governmental organisations.
A Taliban delegation is in Geneva for talks with Swiss officials and
NGOs on humanitarian access and human rights, Switzerland’s foreign
ministry said on Tuesday. The delegation from Afghanistan’s new rulers
is due to hold talks with the Red Cross and other non-governmental
organisations in the Swiss city, which is also home to several United
Nations agencies. <The members of the delegation will have discussions
around humanitarian access to populations in need, the protection of
humanitarian actors and respect for human rights,> a foreign ministry
spokeswoman told the AFP news agency.
<The protection of children during conflicts and the management of land
contaminated by mines are also on the agenda of the conferences, which
take place in a confidential setting.>
The spokeswoman said that Swiss ministry representatives would meet the
delegation this week. However, she stressed that their delegation’s
presence on Swiss territory <does not represent a legitimisation or
recognition of the Taliban>. Switzerland’s ATS news agency reported that
the delegation was being led by Latifullah Hakimi and numbers about 10
people. Hakimi is a senior official at the Taliban defence ministry. He
heads a commission formed by the Taliban government to identify members
who were flouting the group’s regulations.
Complex emergency
Representatives from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation,
the foreign ministry’s Peace and Human Rights Division and its Asia and
Pacific Division are also due to meet the delegation this week.
<Afghanistan is facing a complex emergency situation due to armed
conflicts, COVID-19 and its socioeconomic consequences, as well as
extreme weather conditions,> the foreign ministry spokeswoman said.
<Today, 23 million Afghans are at risk of malnutrition and a large
majority of the population lives below the poverty line.> Since the
Taliban seized control in mid-August as the United States ended its
20-year war in Afghanistan, the country has plunged into financial
chaos, with inflation and unemployment surging. The halting of aid and
sanctions following the Taliban takeover has triggered a humanitarian
crisis in Afghanistan, which has already been devastated by decades of
war.
Calls to find women activists
Meanwhile, on Tuesday, the UN human rights office called for the release
of four women activists and their relatives in Afghanistan who were
detained or abducted last month. The OHCHR said there was no news about
the whereabouts of the four women, who it said reportedly took part in a
protest on women’s rights on January 16, and added it was pressing the
authorities for information on these cases. <We call for their immediate
release,> Liz Throssell, an OHCHR spokesperson, told Geneva-based
journalists. <We are gravely concerned for the safety of the disappeared
women and their family members.> >>
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/8/taliban-delegation-in-geneva-to-discuss-aid-human-rights-concern
The Guardian
7 Feb 2022
The Guardian picture essay
Scared, hungry and cold: child workers in Kabul – picture essay
by Stefanie Glinski
Global development is supported by
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
<<Amid the roadside restaurants and bustling crowds in one of Kabul’s
busiest markets, a 10-year-old girl is trying to sell plastic bags to
shoppers squeezing past her. <If I don’t work, we will go hungry,>
Shaista says. Shops in the Afghan capital are stacked with food, but her
family cannot afford any of it. Each morning, Shaista buys a few
shopping bags for 5 afghani (4p) each, then goes to the market to sell
them for double that. As the UN predicts that 97% of Afghans could be
living below the poverty line by June, the number of child labourers and
beggars has tripled in Kabul, aid workers say. Many are fighting just to
survive. Shaista is shivering in her thin plastic shoes. Temperatures
have dropped below zero. The smells of freshly brewed green tea and warm
bread from a nearby bakery linger in the air, but – unless someone
donates a meal – Shaista will not be eating until dinner. Hundreds of
children – some of them as young as four – work alongside her in the big
market. Others are begging, with their cold small hands stretched out as
they wander through the busy crowds. Afghanistan’s economic downfall has
thrown its people into a hunger crisis. Almost 80% of the former
government’s spending – including countless salaries – was
foreign-funded. Aid made up 43% of Afghanistan’s GDP. When the Taliban
took over the government in August, those development funds were quickly
suspended. More than $9bn (£6.6bn) of mostly private assets remain
frozen in US accounts. The international community now engages carefully
with the Islamic Emirate, as the Taliban regime is officially known,
which is accused of killing dozens of former Afghan officials and
banning women from public office. Shaista, the oldest of four children,
makes up to 50 afghani (40p) on a <good day>. The responsibility weighs
on her. <Every day, my mother buys bread with the money I make.>
Navigating the huge market all day is scary. <I’d like to go to school,>
she says. ...
...Street Child’s country representative, Hamidullah Abawi <“Many have
to acquire food for themselves and their families,> he says. <I have
seen a significant change in the lives of Afghan children in recent
months and it’s heartbreaking.> >>
Note by Gino d'Artali: I only 'edited/copied the last part and only to
urge you to please read (and view the pictures) more:
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2022/feb/07/scared-hungry-and-cold-child-workers-in-kabul-picture-essay
The Guardian
Economics viewpoint
World Bank
The US economic war on Afghanistan amounts to a humanitarian crime
Larry Elliott
<<Washington and the west are inflicting brutal collective punishment on
an already destitute people by freezing assets and aid. The war in
Afghanistan did not end when US and UK troops left Kabul airport last
year: it merely took a different, but still lethal, form. The response
of President Joe Biden to the military humiliation inflicted on America
by the Taliban has been a scorched earth policy designed to cause the
maximum amount of economic damage to what was already one of the world’s
poorest countries. Prosecuting this war by other means involved freezing
Afghan state assets held in New York. It meant the threat of sanctions
against banks and other foreign companies doing business in Afghanistan.
It has involved halting payments from the World Bank’s Afghanistan
Reconstruction Trust Fund (ARTF). It meant no emergency Covid-19
financial help from the International Monetary Fund. At the time, it was
obvious this withdrawal of overseas financial aid – which accounted for
almost half of Afghanistan’s gross domestic product in 2020 – would have
a disastrous impact, and so it has proved. While the illicit opium-based
trade is still going strong, the rest of the economy has pretty much
collapsed. On average, firms have laid off 60% of their workers. The
price of basic foodstuffs has risen by 40%. More than half the
population is in need of humanitarian assistance and the poverty rate is
in the region of 90%. By some distance, these are the highest levels of
distress anywhere in the world. The UN children’s fund (Unicef)
estimates more than a million Afghan children are at risk of dying from
malnutrition or hunger-related disease. The statistics don’t capture the
full picture, of people so desperate for food that they are selling
their young daughters into marriage or having their organs removed for
cash. What is clear is that rather than selectively targeting the
Taliban, the US and its European allies are inflicting collective
punishment on an entire country in the misguided belief that this is
somehow upholding western values. Letting children go hungry does not
uphold western values. Closing schools because teachers are going unpaid
does not uphold estern values. Having lost the war, Washington is now
losing the peace.>>
Read more here:
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/feb/06/the-us-economic-war-on-afghanistan-amounts-to-a-humanitarian
Al Jazeera
2 Feb 2022
<<Afghan universities reopen with small number of women attending
The Taliban has imposed many restrictions on women, but says it has no
objection to education for women.
Some public universities have opened in Afghanistan for the first time
since the Taliban seized power in August, with a trickle of women
attending classes. Most secondary schools for girls and all public
universities were shuttered when the armed group stormed back to power,
sparking fears that women would again be barred from education – as
happened during the Taliban’s first rule from 1996 to 2001. Officials
said universities in Laghman, Nangarhar, Kandahar, Nimroz, Farah and
Helmand provinces opened on Wednesday. The AFP news agency said that one
small group of women, wearing full-body veils or burqa, entered Laghman
University early on Wednesday. A witness talking to the Reuters news
agency in the eastern city of Jalalabad saw female students entering via
a separate door at Nangarhar University, one of the large government
universities opening this week. Zarlashta Haqmal, who studies law and
political science at Nangarhar University, told AFP <it’s a moment of
joy for us that our classes have started.> <But we are still worried
that the Taliban might stop them.> More were scheduled to resume
operations elsewhere in the country later this month. The men who
attended – ferried to the campus in local taxis and buses – were dressed
in traditional tunics known as shalwar kameez. Attendance was very thin
and Taliban fighters guarded the entrance, a tripod-mounted machine gun
resting on a boom gate.
Most students declined to offer their thoughts on returning to class,
with some saying they had been warned by authorities not to speak to the
press. Journalists were prevented from entering the Laghman campus and
universities in other provinces.>>
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/2/afghan-universities-reopen-with-small-number-of-women-attending
Opinion by Gino d'Artali: If the taliban needs tripod-mounted machine
guns one can really ask if this a step closer to education for women
i.e. what they are afraid of, more resistence from the Afghanistan's
Women's Resistance?
A bit outdated maybe but remember what my Mother Gianna d'Artali said
and more than worth reading because the Afghanistan's Women Resistence
did not stop then, on the contrary:
Hurriyet Daily News
09 Sep 2021
<<Afghan women vow to resist Taliban rules.
By Fevzi Kızılkoyun-KABUL
Some women in Afghanistan are determined to resist the Taliban’s strict
rules as they anticipate that their rights and freedoms will be further
confined.
Sitting for an interview at a restaurant in the capital, three Afghan
women recalled life before the group seized power and voiced concern for
their future and the future of their country. We held the interview in
the <family> section of the restaurants since women are not allowed to
sit at the same table with any man, who is not a family member. Those
three were among around 50 women, who last week staged a protest in
Kabul but were brutally dispersed by Taliban fighters. They marched
towards the presidential place with roses in their hands and purple
scarfs only to be confronted by armed Taliban militants. <I used to work
at a cafe and study at the university at the same time. When the Taliban
seized power, the café closed and lost my job. I have no idea if I can
return to university. We were free before, we could work and go out
alone. But we are now confined to our homes, we are worried,> said
Sureyya Nesret. Nesret believes the Taliban has not yet imposed even
harsher rules because the whole world is closely watching the group’s
actions.>>
Read more here:
https://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/afghan-women-vow-to-resist-taliban-rules-167721
The New York Times
By David Zucchino and Yaqoob Akbary
Updated Jan. 26, 2022
<<Threatened and Beaten, Afghan Women Defy Taliban With Protests. The
Taliban have begun cracking down harder as women insist on their rights
and as Western governments call for reforms.
KABUL, Afghanistan — On a raw January morning, Khujasta Elham trudged
through a snowstorm to sign her name on a government register. Before
the Taliban seized power in August, Ms. Elham was director of women’s
programs for Afghanistan’s Civil Service Commission. But she and most
other female government workers were prevented from returning to work by
the Taliban’s new Islamic Emirate. Now Ms. Elham, who says she has not
been paid since August, is required to sign in at her old job site once
a month — a fiction that allows the Taliban to deny that they have fired
female government workers. The grim routine also diminishes any hope for
Ms. Elham that she will one day return to work. The dismissal of female
workers is one of many indignities that have prompted small bands of
women like Ms. Elham to take to the streets in protest, risking beatings
or arrest. Taliban gunmen have pointed weapons at the demonstrators,
sprayed them with pepper spray and called them <whores> and <puppets of
the West,> Human Rights Watch said. Bearing placards and raising their
fists, the women have resisted persistent attempts to erase them from
public life.>>
Read more here:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/24/world/asia/afghan-women-taliban-protests.html
Al Jazeera
By Asad Hashim and Mohsin Khan Momand
31 Jan 2022
<<Kabul, Afghanistan/Islamabad, Pakistan – A week after Taliban and
senior US and European officials held talks in the Norwegian capital,
Oslo, the main outcome appears to be promises of an increase in
humanitarian aid, contingent on demands related to human rights, with
some analysts saying the talks imply a <de facto> recognition of the
Taliban’s government. No foreign government has yet formally recognised
the legitimacy of the Taliban’s rule over Afghanistan, referred to by
the group as the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA), although several
world powers have engaged with the government at various levels. The
talks in Oslo were the first official trip by acting Afghan Foreign
Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi and his delegation to Europe since the Afghan
Taliban captured Kabul and took control of Afghanistan in mid-August.
Following the January 24 talks, diplomats from the United States and
Europe said they told Afghan Taliban officials that humanitarian aid
would be tied to an improvement in the human rights situation in the
country, which international rights groups and Afghan activists have
said has worsened considerably since the Taliban took over.
<[Participants] urged the Taliban to do more to stop the alarming
increase of human rights violations, including arbitrary detentions, …
forced disappearances, media crackdowns, extrajudicial killings, torture
and prohibitions on women and girls’ education, employment and freedom
to travel without a male escort,> said a joint US-European statement
issued after the talks. The talks also recognised <the urgency in
addressing the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan and highlighted
necessary steps to help alleviate the suffering of Afghans across the
country>, the statement said. On Wednesday, United Nations chief Antonio
Guterres said Afghanistan was <hanging by a thread>, as the economy
ground to a halt following the Taliban takeover and ensuing
international sanctions, including the freezing of more than $9bn in
Afghan central bank assets.>>
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/1/31/after-oslo-what-next-for-afghanistan
Al Jazeera
9 Feb 2022
<<WHO chief, Taliban discuss ‘dire’ Afghan health crisis
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus met the Taliban health minister who is part
of Taliban delegation currently visiting Switzerland.
The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday he had
met the health minister in the Taliban-led government in Afghanistan for
talks on the <dire> health and humanitarian crisis in the country. WHO
chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus revealed that he met Qalander Ebad for
talks on Tuesday. Ebad is part of a Taliban delegation visiting Geneva
for a week of talks with institutions and non-governmental agencies on
humanitarian access and human rights, as Afghanistan’s new rulers expand
their international engagement. The Taliban movement returned to power
in Kabul in mid-August as the United States ended its 20-year war in
Afghanistan. Since then, Afghanistan has plunged into financial chaos,
with inflation and unemployment surging, while the halting of aid and US
sanctions has triggered a humanitarian crisis in a country already
devastated by decades of war. Tedros had already met Ebad during his
visit to Kabul in September 2021 in the wake of the Taliban takeover.
<Despite some improvements since then, the health situation in
Afghanistan is still dire and the acute humanitarian crisis is
continuing to put lives at risk,> Tedros said.
He said they discussed health needs in the country, strengthening the
system, emergency preparedness and training the health workforce, in
which women are central. <The acute need in Afghanistan is to deliver
diagnostics to detect the COVID-19 virus, and in particular Omicron, as
the number of cases is on the rise,> Tedros said.
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/9/who-chief-taliban-discuss-dire-afghan-health-crisis
Al Jazeera
9 Feb 2022
<<Humanitarian aid on agenda as Taliban officials land in Geneva
The delegation from Afghanistan’s new rulers is due to hold talks with
the Red Cross and other non-governmental organisations.
A Taliban delegation is in Geneva for talks with Swiss officials and
NGOs on humanitarian access and human rights, Switzerland’s foreign
ministry said on Tuesday. The delegation from Afghanistan’s new rulers
is due to hold talks with the Red Cross and other non-governmental
organisations in the Swiss city, which is also home to several United
Nations agencies. <The members of the delegation will have discussions
around humanitarian access to populations in need, the protection of
humanitarian actors and respect for human rights,> a foreign ministry
spokeswoman told the AFP news agency.
<The protection of children during conflicts and the management of land
contaminated by mines are also on the agenda of the conferences, which
take place in a confidential setting.>
The spokeswoman said that Swiss ministry representatives would meet the
delegation this week. However, she stressed that their delegation’s
presence on Swiss territory <does not represent a legitimisation or
recognition of the Taliban>. Switzerland’s ATS news agency reported that
the delegation was being led by Latifullah Hakimi and numbers about 10
people. Hakimi is a senior official at the Taliban defence ministry. He
heads a commission formed by the Taliban government to identify members
who were flouting the group’s regulations.
Complex emergency
Representatives from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation,
the foreign ministry’s Peace and Human Rights Division and its Asia and
Pacific Division are also due to meet the delegation this week.
<Afghanistan is facing a complex emergency situation due to armed
conflicts, COVID-19 and its socioeconomic consequences, as well as
extreme weather conditions,> the foreign ministry spokeswoman said.
<Today, 23 million Afghans are at risk of malnutrition and a large
majority of the population lives below the poverty line.> Since the
Taliban seized control in mid-August as the United States ended its
20-year war in Afghanistan, the country has plunged into financial
chaos, with inflation and unemployment surging. The halting of aid and
sanctions following the Taliban takeover has triggered a humanitarian
crisis in Afghanistan, which has already been devastated by decades of
war.
Calls to find women activists
Meanwhile, on Tuesday, the UN human rights office called for the release
of four women activists and their relatives in Afghanistan who were
detained or abducted last month. The OHCHR said there was no news about
the whereabouts of the four women, who it said reportedly took part in a
protest on women’s rights on January 16, and added it was pressing the
authorities for information on these cases. <We call for their immediate
release,> Liz Throssell, an OHCHR spokesperson, told Geneva-based
journalists. <We are gravely concerned for the safety of the disappeared
women and their family members.> >>
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/8/taliban-delegation-in-geneva-to-discuss-aid-human-rights-concern
The Guardian
7 Feb 2022
The Guardian picture essay
Scared, hungry and cold: child workers in Kabul – picture essay
by Stefanie Glinski
Global development is supported by
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
<<Amid the roadside restaurants and bustling crowds in one of Kabul’s
busiest markets, a 10-year-old girl is trying to sell plastic bags to
shoppers squeezing past her. <If I don’t work, we will go hungry,>
Shaista says. Shops in the Afghan capital are stacked with food, but her
family cannot afford any of it. Each morning, Shaista buys a few
shopping bags for 5 afghani (4p) each, then goes to the market to sell
them for double that. As the UN predicts that 97% of Afghans could be
living below the poverty line by June, the number of child labourers and
beggars has tripled in Kabul, aid workers say. Many are fighting just to
survive. Shaista is shivering in her thin plastic shoes. Temperatures
have dropped below zero. The smells of freshly brewed green tea and warm
bread from a nearby bakery linger in the air, but – unless someone
donates a meal – Shaista will not be eating until dinner. Hundreds of
children – some of them as young as four – work alongside her in the big
market. Others are begging, with their cold small hands stretched out as
they wander through the busy crowds. Afghanistan’s economic downfall has
thrown its people into a hunger crisis. Almost 80% of the former
government’s spending – including countless salaries – was
foreign-funded. Aid made up 43% of Afghanistan’s GDP. When the Taliban
took over the government in August, those development funds were quickly
suspended. More than $9bn (£6.6bn) of mostly private assets remain
frozen in US accounts. The international community now engages carefully
with the Islamic Emirate, as the Taliban regime is officially known,
which is accused of killing dozens of former Afghan officials and
banning women from public office. Shaista, the oldest of four children,
makes up to 50 afghani (40p) on a <good day>. The responsibility weighs
on her. <Every day, my mother buys bread with the money I make.>
Navigating the huge market all day is scary. <I’d like to go to school,>
she says. ...
...Street Child’s country representative, Hamidullah Abawi <“Many have
to acquire food for themselves and their families,> he says. <I have
seen a significant change in the lives of Afghan children in recent
months and it’s heartbreaking.> >>
Note by Gino d'Artali: I only 'edited/copied the last part and only to
urge you to please read (and view the pictures) more:
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2022/feb/07/scared-hungry-and-cold-child-workers-in-kabul-picture-essay
The Guardian
Economics viewpoint
World Bank
The US economic war on Afghanistan amounts to a humanitarian crime
Larry Elliott
<<Washington and the west are inflicting brutal collective punishment on
an already destitute people by freezing assets and aid. The war in
Afghanistan did not end when US and UK troops left Kabul airport last
year: it merely took a different, but still lethal, form. The response
of President Joe Biden to the military humiliation inflicted on America
by the Taliban has been a scorched earth policy designed to cause the
maximum amount of economic damage to what was already one of the world’s
poorest countries. Prosecuting this war by other means involved freezing
Afghan state assets held in New York. It meant the threat of sanctions
against banks and other foreign companies doing business in Afghanistan.
It has involved halting payments from the World Bank’s Afghanistan
Reconstruction Trust Fund (ARTF). It meant no emergency Covid-19
financial help from the International Monetary Fund. At the time, it was
obvious this withdrawal of overseas financial aid – which accounted for
almost half of Afghanistan’s gross domestic product in 2020 – would have
a disastrous impact, and so it has proved. While the illicit opium-based
trade is still going strong, the rest of the economy has pretty much
collapsed. On average, firms have laid off 60% of their workers. The
price of basic foodstuffs has risen by 40%. More than half the
population is in need of humanitarian assistance and the poverty rate is
in the region of 90%. By some distance, these are the highest levels of
distress anywhere in the world. The UN children’s fund (Unicef)
estimates more than a million Afghan children are at risk of dying from
malnutrition or hunger-related disease. The statistics don’t capture the
full picture, of people so desperate for food that they are selling
their young daughters into marriage or having their organs removed for
cash. What is clear is that rather than selectively targeting the
Taliban, the US and its European allies are inflicting collective
punishment on an entire country in the misguided belief that this is
somehow upholding western values. Letting children go hungry does not
uphold western values. Closing schools because teachers are going unpaid
does not uphold estern values. Having lost the war, Washington is now
losing the peace.>>
Read more here:
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/feb/06/the-us-economic-war-on-afghanistan-amounts-to-a-humanitarian
Al Jazeera
2 Feb 2022
<<Afghan universities reopen with small number of women attending
The Taliban has imposed many restrictions on women, but says it has no
objection to education for women.
Some public universities have opened in Afghanistan for the first time
since the Taliban seized power in August, with a trickle of women
attending classes. Most secondary schools for girls and all public
universities were shuttered when the armed group stormed back to power,
sparking fears that women would again be barred from education – as
happened during the Taliban’s first rule from 1996 to 2001. Officials
said universities in Laghman, Nangarhar, Kandahar, Nimroz, Farah and
Helmand provinces opened on Wednesday. The AFP news agency said that one
small group of women, wearing full-body veils or burqa, entered Laghman
University early on Wednesday. A witness talking to the Reuters news
agency in the eastern city of Jalalabad saw female students entering via
a separate door at Nangarhar University, one of the large government
universities opening this week. Zarlashta Haqmal, who studies law and
political science at Nangarhar University, told AFP <it’s a moment of
joy for us that our classes have started.> <But we are still worried
that the Taliban might stop them.> More were scheduled to resume
operations elsewhere in the country later this month. The men who
attended – ferried to the campus in local taxis and buses – were dressed
in traditional tunics known as shalwar kameez. Attendance was very thin
and Taliban fighters guarded the entrance, a tripod-mounted machine gun
resting on a boom gate.
Most students declined to offer their thoughts on returning to class,
with some saying they had been warned by authorities not to speak to the
press. Journalists were prevented from entering the Laghman campus and
universities in other provinces.>>
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/2/afghan-universities-reopen-with-small-number-of-women-attending
Opinion by Gino d'Artali: If the taliban needs tripod-mounted machine
guns one can really ask if this a step closer to education for women
i.e. what they are afraid of, more resistence from the Afghanistan's
Women's Resistance?
A bit outdated maybe but remember what my Mother Gianna d'Artali said
and more than worth reading because the Afghanistan's Women Resistence
did not stop then, on the contrary:
Hurriyet Daily News
09 Sep 2021
<<Afghan women vow to resist Taliban rules.
By Fevzi Kızılkoyun-KABUL
Some women in Afghanistan are determined to resist the Taliban’s strict
rules as they anticipate that their rights and freedoms will be further
confined.
Sitting for an interview at a restaurant in the capital, three Afghan
women recalled life before the group seized power and voiced concern for
their future and the future of their country. We held the interview in
the <family> section of the restaurants since women are not allowed to
sit at the same table with any man, who is not a family member. Those
three were among around 50 women, who last week staged a protest in
Kabul but were brutally dispersed by Taliban fighters. They marched
towards the presidential place with roses in their hands and purple
scarfs only to be confronted by armed Taliban militants. <I used to work
at a cafe and study at the university at the same time. When the Taliban
seized power, the café closed and lost my job. I have no idea if I can
return to university. We were free before, we could work and go out
alone. But we are now confined to our homes, we are worried,> said
Sureyya Nesret. Nesret believes the Taliban has not yet imposed even
harsher rules because the whole world is closely watching the group’s
actions.>>
Read more here:
https://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/afghan-women-vow-to-resist-taliban-rules-167721
The New York Times
By David Zucchino and Yaqoob Akbary
Updated Jan. 26, 2022
<<Threatened and Beaten, Afghan Women Defy Taliban With Protests. The
Taliban have begun cracking down harder as women insist on their rights
and as Western governments call for reforms.
KABUL, Afghanistan — On a raw January morning, Khujasta Elham trudged
through a snowstorm to sign her name on a government register. Before
the Taliban seized power in August, Ms. Elham was director of women’s
programs for Afghanistan’s Civil Service Commission. But she and most
other female government workers were prevented from returning to work by
the Taliban’s new Islamic Emirate. Now Ms. Elham, who says she has not
been paid since August, is required to sign in at her old job site once
a month — a fiction that allows the Taliban to deny that they have fired
female government workers. The grim routine also diminishes any hope for
Ms. Elham that she will one day return to work. The dismissal of female
workers is one of many indignities that have prompted small bands of
women like Ms. Elham to take to the streets in protest, risking beatings
or arrest. Taliban gunmen have pointed weapons at the demonstrators,
sprayed them with pepper spray and called them <whores> and <puppets of
the West,> Human Rights Watch said. Bearing placards and raising their
fists, the women have resisted persistent attempts to erase them from
public life.>>
Read more here:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/24/world/asia/afghan-women-taliban-protests.html
Al Jazeera
By Asad Hashim and Mohsin Khan Momand
31 Jan 2022
<<Kabul, Afghanistan/Islamabad, Pakistan – A week after Taliban and
senior US and European officials held talks in the Norwegian capital,
Oslo, the main outcome appears to be promises of an increase in
humanitarian aid, contingent on demands related to human rights, with
some analysts saying the talks imply a <de facto> recognition of the
Taliban’s government. No foreign government has yet formally recognised
the legitimacy of the Taliban’s rule over Afghanistan, referred to by
the group as the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA), although several
world powers have engaged with the government at various levels. The
talks in Oslo were the first official trip by acting Afghan Foreign
Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi and his delegation to Europe since the Afghan
Taliban captured Kabul and took control of Afghanistan in mid-August.
Following the January 24 talks, diplomats from the United States and
Europe said they told Afghan Taliban officials that humanitarian aid
would be tied to an improvement in the human rights situation in the
country, which inte national rights groups and Afghan activists have
said has worsened considerably since the Taliban took over.
<[Participants] urged the Taliban to do more to stop the alarming
increase of human rights violations, including arbitrary detentions, …
forced disappearances, media crackdowns, extrajudicial killings, torture
and prohibitions on women and girls’ education, employment and freedom
to travel without a male escort,> said a joint US-European statement
issued after the talks. The talks also recognised <the urgency in
addressing the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan and highlighted
necessary steps to help alleviate the suffering of Afghans across the
country>, the statement said. On Wednesday, United Nations chief Antonio
Guterres said Afghanistan was <hanging by a thread>, as the economy
ground to a halt following the Taliban takeover and ensuing
international sanctions, including the freezing of more than $9bn in
Afghan central bank assets.>>
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/1/31/after-oslo-what-next-for-afghanistan
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