Afghan women are desperately afraid that once the US and the UK pull out of the war, things will get really bad for them. They are already experiencing, bombings of female schools, abuse and rape. Here is a portion of a long article regarding this current event:
Afghan Women Fear For the Future 2/4/11
"Samira Hamidi, director of the Afghan Women's Network – an umbrella organisation for more than 600 women's rights groups and NGOs – has also noticed this increasing lack of interest and fears that once the troops pull out, the west will turn its eyes away from Afghanistan, even though "the insurgents still kill children, they still put poison in the food of school girls, they throw acid in the face of school girls, they burn schools. They still exist."
"Something most American male politicians have said – 90% of them – is that it's just their culture and we can't do anything about it," adds Salbi.
Deniz Kandiyoti of the School of Oriental and African Studies' gender studies department disputes these claims that the culture is to blame. "These people have been tossed to the wind and displaced, the old society has been eroded. Girls being given away to pay for opium debts, that's hardly traditional. Now it is the people with the guns, the money, and the drugs runners who have power," she says.
Few would argue that improvements have been made in women's rights in the last decade. On a recent visit to the UK, Hussan Ghazanfar, Afghanistan's minister for women's affairs, outlined the progress made: 57% of women and girls now go to school, and 24% of health sector workers and 10% of the judiciary are female.
Yet activists say improvements are patchy and far from ideal – with healthcare, social care and freedom unavailable to many poverty-stricken rural women, many already living in Taliban-controlled areas. Even Ghazanfar admits: "Life is different in the countryside – the literacy level is different, traditional customs are stronger, and women have no financial or economic freedom there."
Hamidi says most women she speaks to "are tired of war and killing", and fearful of the future. "If the situation goes bad again the women here have nowhere to go."...
20 Female Schools Bombed
Yet Rachel Reid, Human Rights Watch's Afghanistan researcher, says: "There may be some low-level Taliban leaders who negotiate with communities that want girls' education, but there is no evidence to suggest that the leadership has done a U-turn."
She points out that the ministry's own statistics show that 20 girls' schools were bombed or burned down between March and October 2010. At least 126 students and teachers were killed in the same period – an increase from the previous year. Meanwhile, night letters – missives containing terrifying threats – are still being sent to working women in Taliban-controlled areas. One sent to a teacher in a girls' school read: "We warn you to leave your job as a teacher as soon as possible otherwise we will cut the heads off your children and shall set fire to your daughter."
Suicide, Forced Marriage, and Rape
The Taliban are not the only group in Afghanistan keen to destroy women's rights, says Nemat. "Westerners think the only enemy Afghan women have is the Taliban, and when they go we will be liberated. But Afghan women have many men who are scared of women having power. These are warlords, conservative clerics, many powerful authorities sitting in key government positions."
In this anti-female environment violence against women in general is rising daily, fuelled by the war, the poverty it brings, and the conservative values it leaves behind, according to Hamidi. Refuges are attacked in the media, while anecdotal evidence suggests that self-immolation, domestic violence and suicide among women are increasing.
In December, a UN report on "harmful traditional practices" revealed that 57% of Afghan marriages are child marriages (where one partner is under the age of 16) and cited the case of an orphaned 13-year-old girl who was bought by a 65-year-old man for $3,000 (£1,895). Then there are the honour killings and the fact that women and girls who run away – to escape forced marriages or violence – are often arrested, prosecuted and imprisoned, usually under a charge of attempting to commit zina (sex outside marriage)."
Perhaps we can all learn something from the Mennonite people. They may be a bit different, but hey are humble, quiet people who are always willing to lend a helping hand someone in need. I have a lot of respect for their willingness to assist in times of disaster, when it doesn't even involve themselves. They believe in helping their fellow neighbor, even if they are across the country.
