format_quote Originally Posted by
Count DeSheep
From the Wikipedia entry on the Taliban:
The Taliban government has been severely criticized for not respecting the human rights of women. Women were prohibited from leaving their homes, unless they were completely covered; no part of their faces, hair or body was to be shown out in the public. Religious police patrols forced women to wear burqa of a specified length, and even minor deviations could result in public punishment, as women were beaten with thin sticks at the ankles for wearing burqas that were "too short". The education of women suffered too, and women were deprived even of elementary education.
The Taliban continued a long trend of the brutal oppression of the Hazara people in Afganistan. Most Hazara are Shia Muslims, and the staunchly Sunni Taliban conisder Shia Islam to be heretical. During the last years of Taliban rule, this oppression took the form of mass killings and burnings of cities and villages. On August 10, 1998, Mulla Niazi (Governor of Mazar Sharif) declared a Fatwah against the Hazara, pronouncing the Hazara as infidels to be killed with impunity. During the years that followed, rapes and massacres of Hazara by Taliban forces were documented by groups such as Human Rights Watch.
Al-Qaeda's entry:
Al-Qaeda is also suspected in the November 9, 2005 Amman, Jordan attacks in which three simultaneous bombings occurred at American franchise-owned hotels in Amman. The blasts killed 57 and injured 120 people. Most of the injured and killed were attending a wedding at the Radisson Hotel
Al-Qaeda is believed to have conducted the bombings in August 1998 of the U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, killing more than 200 people and injuring more than 5,000 others.
If you want more, I'll give it to you. Then again, you seem like the kind of person that makes their own facts, so you shouldn't need any help. XP
Dont worry do not think you are that fast,
Warlord's men commit rape in revenge against Taliban
By David Filipov, Globe Staff, 2/24/2002
ALKH, Afghanistan - In a country where women have long lived in the shadows, rape is an especially potent political weapon. To this, the women of northern Afghanistan can attest - at least those who dare speak publicly.
The ouster of the Taliban by the US-backed Northern Alliance did not stop the use of rape as a way to demoralize and dominate. But what has changed since the fall is the identity of the victims, now mostly Pashtun families and displaced people living in camps, the losers following the defeat of the Pashtun-dominated Taliban.
The crime is perpetrated, say victims and aid workers, by the men who answer to warlord Abdul Rashid Dostum, a Northern Alliance commander whose 3,000-man army, Junbish-e- illie, now rules much of the country's north.
Most women are too afraid and ashamed to talk about being raped. But, Nazu, a Pashtun mother of 10, was willing to describe what happened to her, and to her girls.
It was, she said, a little over a month ago. She had put her children to bed when five heavily armed Junbish soldiers burst into their modest compound in Balkh, 12 miles west of Mazar-e- Sharif.
Over the next eight hours, she said, one soldier held her crippled husband, Jamaludin, at gunpoint as the others took her three oldest girls into the room and raped them repeatedly - first Fatima, 14, then Bibi Aisha, 12, and then Bibi Amena, 10. Then they came for Nazu.
''The soldier pointed a gun at me. He told me I was a Pashtun,'' Nazu, 40, said as she and her daughters crouched against the dusty wall of their home, faces partially hidden behind scarves, their eyes lowered.
''I was afraid. I could not resist. I am a woman, and they had guns. I could not stop them.''
Officials deny attacks; local police powerless
Pashtun leaders and foreign aid workers say the assault on Nazu and her daughters is only one example in a horrifying trend.
Pashtuns, an ethnic group that made up the bulk of the Taliban, say Junbish soldiers have committed rape as part of their reprisals against the people they blame for the regime's oppressive rule.
Pashtun families in Balkh have not been the only victims. Three weeks ago, Junbish soldiers, who rule much of northern Afghanistan, rampaged through the outskirts of Dawlatabad, 20 miles north of Mazar-e-Sharif. Nur Mohammad, a local Pashtun leader, said 30 houses were attacked.
''Women were assaulted, but none of them will talk to you,'' he said.
At the Sakhi camp for displaced people outside Mazar-e-Sharif, armed Junbish have raped dozens of women since the Taliban left last November, local and foreign aid workers say.
''This is a problem that needs to be investigated,'' said one, on the condition he not be named.
The trouble is that foreign aid agencies depend on the local commanders - Dostum, ethnic Hazara leader Mohammad Mohaqiq, and ethnic Tajik leader Ustad Atta Mohammad - to do their jobs. Borders, roads, warehouses, even the buildings foreign organizations rent, are all under the control of the warlords.
Dostum's security officers routinely harass anyone who appears to be asking too many of the wrong questions.
Meanwhile, General Shakh Zoda, a Dostum aide, denied that Junbish soldiers had assaulted civilians. Mohammad Isa Eftekhari, the government-appointed police chief for Mazar-e-Sharif and the surrounding area, also told the Globe he had no knowledge of any attacks on civilians.
In this atmosphere of denial, local police are powerless to do anything. The police force in the town of Balkh numbers 110 men; the Junbish have more than 700 armed men in the town.
''If someone told you about a terrible crime the Junbish committed, what guarantees of protection could you give them?'' asked one Afghan who works for a foreign aid organization. ''We can't do anything because we have no power.''
Amir Hamza, the ethnic Tajik police chief of Balkh, agreed.
''Junbish commanders protect their soldiers from us,'' he said.
He said it was likely that many more Pashtun women had been raped, but they were afraid to tell anyone. ''It is also possible that some women do not want to discuss this crime with anyone. They are ashamed.''
Threatened and ashamed, victims remain silent
Rape has been used as a weapon of terror in other wars throughout history, most recently in the Balkans. In Kosovo, ethnic Albanian women who were raped by Serb soldiers were evicted when their families found out.
One of the bloodiest and most violent chapters in recent Afghan history occurred when Taliban fighters captured Mazar-e-Sharif in August 1998. In a few days more civilians were killed, and murdered and raped, than at any time in the previous 20 years of war in Afghanistan.
Now, like then, women who are victims of assault are pressured to be silent. Even with the liberation of Afghanistan from Taliban rule, the culture of oppression is slow to change. Especially in the north, women are expected to stay at home and never speak to strangers.
''Many times the Junbish committed these crimes, but Pashtun women have pride and they cannot tell people,'' said one villager.
Pashtun families make easy targets because the Junbish disarmed many of them when Dostum's troops, assisted by US special forces who continue to accompany the warlord everywhere, drove out the Taliban.
''The Junbish see a home, and they know there are Pashtuns living there, and they go inside and rape the women and threaten the men not to talk about it,'' said Amir Jan, the leader of the Pashtun community in the Balkh area. ''They know no one can do anything about it.''
Nazu was also afraid to speak out, and for good reason. The day after the soldiers assaulted her and her daughters, the soldiers came back and told the terror-stricken family that if they repeated this story to anyone, they would die. Jamaludin went to the police anyway, but he was told that they could not do anything.
It was Nazu's neighbor Safi Nubi who tried to get the police to investigate the assault on Nazu and her daughters. They arrested one man but set him free soon after. One of the assailants on Jamaludin's family lives nearby and still roams freely with the Junbish. Also because of this, Nubi said, many more women who have been raped are afraid to come forward.
''If Junbish soldiers commit a crime, the Junbish is very strong,'' Nubi said as tears welled in his eyes. ''The police cannot do anything. These people are afraid. They think that the Junbish will kill them.''
Jamaludin said he was too ashamed to take his wife and children to the hospital after the assault. When the government in Kabul sent a woman doctor to Balkh 20 days ago, he considered taking them, but he did not have any money; the soldiers had stolen it.
''We aren't feeling very well,'' said Nazu as she nursed her infant girl. ''It is shameful for us to explain.''
Her daughters looked on. It was hard to say whether the 10-year-old, Bibi Amena, understood what had happened to her. It was Fatima, 14, who spoke, revealing a young face covered in scars.
''Please help us,'' Fatima said, ''and take care of us.''
The Taliban, Education and Health Policy Toward Girls. (untold Truth)
"According to a survey by the Swedish Comittie for Afghanistan (SCA), 80% of girls schools were located in rural afghanistan and under the Taliban were operating in full swing. Ms Pia Karlsson, education advisor at the SCA, said 85% of girls were stil in schools. In Kunduz Province, under the Taliban, 122 girls schools were operating, with 390 registered female teachers!"
The Taliban were the prime target in an Anti-Islamic drive in the media, to prepare the public for war against them.
All the women who shrill at the burqa, were silent when 2 million afghans died from Russian bombs, they were silent went 500'000 afghans were maimed by mines, and were silent about thousands of women who were raped before the Taliban came to power.
General Hamid who lived under the Taliban for several years.
There has been no campaign aimed at beating women in public, and there has been no ban on education for women. Only a restriction on co-education.
There are many lies on "respected websites about the "suffering" of Afghan women, yet there are no dates, names, places or anything other form of verification. Hamid gul says he found women almost always-outnumbered men in the streets and market places.
The Afghan women protesting in the west come from the Khalq and parcham factions of Afghan communists. They represent a tiny fraction of the population.
The Taliban were extra strict on these communist women to ensure they didn’t cause friction and trouble and stir up trouble. The women only had to wear the Burqa in the streets, at home; they were free to dress as they pleased. According to a female nurse, women in hospitals rarely wore the burqa or even hijab as there were no men present.
According to a survey by the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan (SCA), 80% of girl’s schools were located in rural Afghanistan and under the Taliban were operating in full swing. Ms Pia Karlsson, education advisor at the SCA, said 85% of girls were still in schools. In Kunduz Province, under the Taliban, 122 girls schools were operating, with 390 registered female teachers!
Prior to Taliban rule, there were 350 beds in Kabul for women. In august 2001, there were 950 beds for women in women only hospitals in Kabul. Some women only hospitals include Rabia Balkhi Hospital, Malali Hospital, Khair Khana Hospital, Indira Gandhi Health Hospital, Atta Turk Hospital, Kuwait Red Crescent health Centre and a Contagios Disease Health Clinic! There were also 32 Mother and Child clinics.
In addition, the women received treatment at the ICRC and Sanday Gal Orthopaedic Centres. In All these hospitals and centres, only women doctors and nurses worked providing health care.
Yet the Sun, Dailey express, New York Times, and all these tabloid press agencies never reported any of this, neither did the BBC, CNN, Fox news etc. It was part of a campaign of lies and deception to turn the public against the Taliban.
You were told women couldn’t work, women could not go out the house, that women could not go to school, or even go to hospitals, well the facts are proving otherwise.
The Taliban and Women
The treatment of women in Afghanistan is a subject that the Western Media and Feminists have concentrated their ideological warfare efforts on. They have based their 'reports' and analyses on a number of interviews with Communist women, whose idea of 'freedom' is similar to the freedom given to women in the West, i.e. that all women should make all parts of their bodies available to men to view and use; that in order to be good you must look good (thus creating an inferioriety complex and problems such as Anorexia eating disorders in young women who cannot accept that they do not look like beautiful models) and the use of naked and half-naked women to sell everything from cars to toilet paper. It is important to look at the policies of the Taliban as regards women and the facts in the country itself, as reported by independent journalists.
Women's Life Conditions Presently and Under Rabbani Regime
The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is fully committed to the social, cultural and economic development of women. The government has been able to protect the honor, life and property of Afghan women. Contrary to the situation under the Rabbani regime, women can now be outside their houses safely without the fear of being kidnaped, raped or looted. They no longer fear conditions that were common during the Rabbani regime. According to amnesty international reports of 1992-95, women in Afghanistan bore the brunt of the atrocities by the Rabbani regime and other armed factions. Irresponsible commanders and gunmen not only violated the honor of women by raping them but mutilated women's bodies and in many cases, cut their breasts etc. Similarly, common was murder, torture and execution of our people by the armed factions. Due to the intolerable atrocities, the Taleban Islamic Movement emerged to deliver the defenseless Afghan people from the cruel hands of the warlords. One should ask oneself, is women's freedom to be raped with their breasts cut, or is it to freely live their lives without fear of even comments being made at them.
The former regime that did not serve the country had employed women in a number of sectors without any real need. Some of them were used just for the sexual entertainment of the bureaucracy. Due to the ineffective and immoral institutions, they have temporarily been relieved of their duties. The government pays them their salaries regularly. But women whose work is really needed, are still working in the health, education and security sectors. As conditions in the country improve, so will, doubtlessly, job opportunities for women.
Restoration of Women's Safety, Dignity and Freedom
Being highly concerned about the well-being of its female citizens, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, soon introduced measures to put a stop to the miserable living conditions under which the women lived in Kabul. After the communists took over in Kabul, they began to exploit women for the purpose of advancing their political and social agendas. In spite of war condition in the country and with no work in the offices, the communist regime forced a large number of women to attend government offices only for their amusement.
The Islamic Emirate decided to pay the salaries of these women at their homes, so that they could stay home and take care of their families and children. The purpose of this policy is to help revive the Afghan family and household, as the foundation of the Afghan society, a foundation that was intentionally destroyed by the communist regime.
The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is determined to provide educational and employment opportunities for the women of Afghanistan, as soon as the security and financial circumstances under which the Islamic Emirate operates allow such a step to be taken. In the meantime, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan will try to acquire the resources and build the facilities that would make the separate education of women possible.
Observance of Islamic Hejab or the Veil
The enforcement of the code of Islamic Hejab by the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is fully consistent with the Islamic beliefs of Afghans and the traditions of the Afghan society. Wearing a veil is common among women all over Afghanistan. Islam and Afghan tradition attach the greatest importance to the honor and safety of women in the society.
To comply with the Islamic code of Hejab, as well as to reduce the degree of threat to the personal safety of women, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is asking the women to observe the Islamic Hejab, and cover their faces in public. This is a measure that is undertaken for the simple reason of protecting the honor, dignity, and personal safety of the women in Afghanistan.
Women's Education in the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan
Based on the holy teachings of Islam, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan considers education as the pillar of a healthy and prosperous individual and social life. The Islamic Emirate is determined to provide educational opportunities for all Afghans irrespective of gender, race, tribe, language, or regional affiliations.
The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan considers education to be obligatory equally for men and women according to the tenets of Islam. This is a clear verdict of our religion. However, currently the country is in shambles, its economic structure destroyed and education facilities turned to rubble like much else in the country. Afghanistan requires appropriate foreign assistance to rebuild every aspect of educational institutions. The present war situation imposed and fueled by foreign powers diverts from Afghanistan's already meager national resources that would be better allocated to opening more schools. Larger and more centrally-run schools in urban areas present the greatest challenge. Secondly, the Afghans do not trust the communist-style curriculum. We have to restore the trust of the common people in government-run education. We also need to compile a new curriculum that will answer to the needs of our society. Thirdly, the war has created a huge brain drain in all sectors including education. In order to successfully tackle restoration of educational, economic, political and social institutions, the government wants to attract Afghan professionals and intellectuals living abroad. We want them to take part in the reconstruction of their country. Without their full participation in the rehabilitation and development efforts, the Islamic Emirate will not be able to tackle these issues successfully.
The conditions today for the implementation of a sound, effective, and Islamic educational program for the women of Afghanistan are nonexistent. Over ninety percent of school buildings have been ruined by the war. Qualified teachers have left the country. School books are full of communist propaganda and indoctrination material. Because of past abuses of the educational system for the purpose of propagating atheist ideology and ideas, the great majority of Afghan fathers and mothers have lost faith in schools and secular education. Last but not least, in spite of its deep desire to activate the schooling system in the country, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan has been facing great difficulties in securing the financial and physical resources needed to provide security for the schools, reconstruct school buildings, print new books, acquire the necessary materials and pay for qualified and dependable teachers.
The limited amount of resources at the disposal of the Islamic Emirate are being used to finance a war that has been imposed on Afghanistan by the brazen and open intervention of countries such as Iran, Russia, Uzbekistan and India. Intervention by these countries, and the resulting terrorist activities launched against the innocent men and women of Afghanistan by groups affiliated to these countries, have made the task of providing security for schools and public buildings, particularly girl's schools, extremely difficult.
Currently Operating Girls' Schools
Despite the limited economic resources of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan to fund educational institutes, universities in Qandahar, Kabul and Nangrahar provinces are operating as usual. Several NGOs have been allowed to fund schools in Afghanistan, besides the schools funded by the government.
Contrary to reports about girls education in the press, the figures obtained from the education sector in Afghanistan, reveal that girls education in rural Afghanistan is increasing. According to a survey conducted by the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan (SCA), almost 80 per cent of the girls schools located in rural areas under the administration of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan are operating in full swing. Ms. Pia Karlsson, education advisor at the Education Technical Support Unit (ETSU) of SCA, said in a recent interview published by the Frontier Post, a Peshawar based English daily that only in Ghazni province, where the Islamic Emirate under the leadership of TIMA has control for the last two years, approximately 85 per cent of the girls are still in schools. Ms. Karlsson says, "The picture outside the cities is totally different."
The SCA which has been supporting elementary education in Afghanistan since 1984, currently supports 422 boys schools, 125 girls schools and 897 mixed schools (co-education) in the forms of primary schools and home schools. During the survey, she concentrated on 100 SCA supported girls schools in the nine provinces: Kabul, Kunar, Laghman, Ningarhar, Ghzani, Logar, Paktika, Paktya and Wardak. All these provinces are under the administration of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. According to the survey, female attendance was at 94 per cent and of the 7834 girls enrolled, 7341 were found present. More significantly, at least 170 female teachers were found teaching in these schools. Similarly, in Kunduz province, 122 schools are operating with 390 female teachers teaching at the schools. The Islamic Emirate is ready to open girls and boys schools with appropriate foreign assistance.
Female Health Sector
Health facilities for women have increased 200% during Taleban administration. Prior to the Taleban Islamic Movement's taking control of Kabul, there were 350 beds in all hospitals in Kabul. Currently, there are more than 950 beds for women in exclusive women's hospitals. Some hospitals which have specifically been allocated to women include Rabia Balkhi Hospital, Malali Hospital, Khair Khana Hospital, Indira Gandhi Child Health Hospital, Atta Turk Hospital, Kuwait Red Crescent Hospital, Contagious Disease Hospital and T.B. Hospital. Moreover, there are 32 mother and child health clinics. In addition to this, women receive treatment at ICRC and the Sandy Gal Orthopaedic Centers. In all these hospitals and clinics, women work as doctors and nurses to provide health services to female patients.
Please also read Canadian Physician describes Healthcare in Afghanistan and American Journalists set the story straight on Afghanistan for further independent refutations on the ill treatment of women in Afghanistan.
hmm?