Taliban hard-liners turning back the clock in Afghanistan

ISLAMABAD — Taliban hard-liners are turning again the clock in Afghanistan with a flurry of repressive edicts over the previous days that hark to their harsh rule from the late Nineties.

Ladies have been banned from going to highschool past the sixth grade, ladies are barred from boarding planes in the event that they journey unaccompanied by a male family member. Women and men can solely go to public parks on separate days and using cell telephones in universities is prohibited.

It doesn’t cease there.

Worldwide media broadcasts — together with the Pashto and Persian BBC companies, which broadcast within the two languages of Afghanistan — are off the air as of the weekend. So are overseas drama collection.

For the reason that Taliban seized management of the nation in mid-August, over the last chaotic weeks of the U.S. and NATO pullout after 20 years of struggle, the worldwide neighborhood has been involved they might impose the identical strict legal guidelines as once they beforehand dominated Afghanistan.

The most recent assault on ladies’s rights got here earlier this month, when the all-male and religiously pushed Taliban authorities broke its promise to permit ladies to return to highschool after the sixth grade. The transfer surprised a lot of the world — and plenty of in Afghanistan — particularly after the Taliban had given all “the required assurances” that this was not going to occur.

The United Nations has known as the banning of worldwide media broadcasts “one other repressive step towards the individuals of Afghanistan.” The web site of the BBC Pashto service stated it was “a worrying growth at a time of uncertainty and turbulence.”

“Greater than 6 million Afghans eat the BBC’s impartial and neutral journalism on TV each week and it’s essential they aren’t denied entry to it sooner or later,” BBC World Providers’ head of languages Tarik Kafala stated in a press release Sunday.

On Monday, members of the Taliban vice and advantage ministry stood outdoors authorities ministries, ordering male workers with out conventional turbans and beards — seen as an emblem of piety — to go dwelling. One worker who was advised to go dwelling stated he didn’t know if and when he would be capable to return to work. He spoke on situation of anonymity, fearing for his security.

Based on a senior Taliban official and Afghans aware of the Taliban’s management, the push to return to the previous — which resulted within the edicts — emerged from a three-day assembly final week within the southern metropolis of Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban.

They are saying the edicts stem from the calls for of the Taliban’s hard-line supreme chief, Haibatullah Akhundzada, who is outwardly attempting to steer the nation again to the late Nineties, when the Taliban had banned ladies from training and public areas, and outlawed music, tv and plenty of sports activities.

“The youthful among the many Taliban don’t agree with a few of these edicts however they aren’t comfy contradicting the elders,” stated Torek Farhadi, an analyst who served as adviser to earlier Afghan governments. Farhadi, who has been involved with Taliban officers since their return to energy, didn’t elaborate.

The extra pragmatic among the many Taliban are resisting the edicts — or a minimum of silently ignoring them, Farhadi stated.

Since their takeover of the nation, the Taliban have been attempting to transition from insurgency and struggle to governing, with the hard-liners more and more at odds with the pragmatists on easy methods to run a rustic within the midst of a humanitarian disaster and an financial system in free fall.

The Taliban management at present is totally different from the one-man rule of Mullah Mohammad Omar, the reclusive founding father of the Taliban motion within the mid-Nineties who reigned with a heavy hand. A divide is rising between some inside the outdated guard, who uphold the cruel rule of the previous and a youthful technology of Taliban leaders who see a way forward for engagement with the worldwide neighborhood.

The youthful technology sees rights for each women and men, although nonetheless inside their interpretation of Islamic regulation — however one that enables college for women and girls within the workforce.

“The youthful Taliban want to talk up,” stated Farhadi.

Nonetheless, Akhundzada has modelled himself on Mullah Omar, preferring to remain in distant Kandahar, removed from the eyes of the general public, relatively than rule from the Afghan capital of Kabul. He additionally adheres to Pashtun tribal mores — traditions the place ladies are hidden away and ladies are married off at puberty.