‘Our country has turned into a jail for women’

KABUL (Agencies): Law students and lawyers in Afghanistan are filing reports with JURIST on the situation there after the Taliban takeover. Here, a female Afghan law student expresses her disgust at growing Taliban restrictions on women, most recently severe rules on the wearing of full hijabs in public. For privacy and security reasons, we are withholding our correspondent’s name. The text has only been lightly edited to respect the author’s voice.
In this place, we burn. We have to fight for survival, for freedom and for human rights. We must be brave and combative in order not to be subjected to violence and oppression. Womens are victims of wrong ideologies and a harsh culture. They have been beaten and stoned and burned and injured. Afghan women have always observed the Islamic hijab and the social culture of Islam. Hijab is not just that black obligatory uniform that the Taliban lately announced. They may try to take the color from our dresses but our brains are colorful enough to circulate brightness.
We will never give up. Every time we are suppressed we will get up and fight for our rights. In the years of greater equality before the Taliban, Afghan women became doctors, engineers, lawyers , politicians and artists. In that time women were progressing, seizing opportunities for better education and better life. But now the Taliban are gutting our basic rights. Our country has turned into a jail for women. But these days of not being able to get education, not having freedom of speech and not being able to work won’t be forever. Afghan women have shown their bravery and they will resist to regain their rights. These black days will pass. Taliban! The world is developing! People are flying in to space and exploring the depths of the oceans, but under your rule Afghanistan is facing mass hunger. Soon the country will face growing illiteracy too.