Only int'l pressure can stop Talib oppression of women

Letter to the Editor

Following my participation in the United Nations 4th World Conference on Women, held in Beijing in 1995, I created the 100 Heroines Project to recognize and support women around the world who are putting themselves at risk on behalf of women's rights.

Through this global project I realized that, while women are oppressed in many countries, nowhere is the situation so extreme as in Afghanistan. Not only are Afghan women prevented by the Taliban from exercising their most basic rights to education, healthcare, employment and freedom of movement, but the Taliban regime is instituting this denial of human rights into law.

I know from personal experience the extreme measures Islamic militants will use to achieve their goals.

In December, 1998, I was among a group of 16 tourists taken hostage by the Aden Abyan Islamic Army in Yemen. Four of our group were shot dead and two badly wounded by gunfire. Like these Yemenis militants, the Taliban use violence and a distorted interpretation of Islam to force their ideology on others.

In Dushanbe, Tajikistan, on June 27-28th, 2000, I personally witnessed a gathering of more than two hundred Afghan women who gave testimony to the terrible conditions imposed on them in Afghanistan. These women also drafted their Declaration of the Fundamental Rights of Afghan Women to reaffirm the rights they enjoyed before the Taliban regime.

In support of this Declaration, we non-Afghans who were present at the Dushanbe Conference composed the Call for Action [eds: see below] document to help bring world attention to the human rights tragedy currently being indicted on Afghan women by the Taliban and by their Pakistan supporters. The Taliban can only persist in suppressing the human rights of Afghan women if the international community stands by and allows it to happen.

Dr. Mary P. Quin (signed)

***************

Call for Action by WORFA

Dushanbe, Tajikistan, 28 June 2000

We, a group of 45 people, of whom 43 are women of various nationalities (Algerian, French, American and Spanish) have come to Dushanbe on June 27th and 28th 2000, as individuals or representatives of women's organizations. Women on the Road for Afghanistan (WORFA) is part of the Worldwide March of Women taking place five years after the Beijing Conference on Women. Here in Dushanbe, we met with more than two hundred Afghan refugee women who have fled the war in Afghanistan. They came to this meeting to give witness to and write up their "Declaration of the Fundamental Rights of Afghan Women."

After hearing the direct testimonies of these women and taking into consideration the reports made by international organizations investigating the war in Afghanistan, we hereby state that we consider the vicious oppression of women in Afghanistan to be as serious an issue as the training of terrorists or drug trafficking.

Therefore, WE THE UNDERSIGNED, DENOUNCE:

* The barbaric acts and massive attacks on fundamental rights committed against the women of Afghanistan by the Taliban regime.

* The suppression of freedom to move about, to work and to access healthcare.

* The attacks on woman's dignity and invasion of private and family life, attacks that cause irreparable physical and mental damage and are international crimes against humanity.

* The cynical pretense of the Taliban regime that claims to subscribe to the international laws protecting the rights of women and men.

* The international drug traffic by the Taliban representing 80% of the world production of heroin.

* The fact that the zones controlled by the Taliban have become an epicenter generating international terrorism which has become a threat to democracies.

* Pakistan's active alliance in providing logistics and arms support to the Taliban regime.

* The "neutrality" of the international community, international organizations and world states which in effect constitutes complicity with the criminal acts of the Taliban.

WE THE UNDERSIGNED SUPPORT:

In relation to the above, we, acting as individuals and representatives of organizations solemnly call upon:

1. To publicly support the Afghan Women's Declaration of Rights written in Dushanbe on June 28th, 2000, by the Afghan women meeting there. 

2. To urgently carry out actions that will favor the establishment of a democratic system in Afghanistan. 

For more information, contact: Shoukria Haidar, NEGAR, Association, B.P. 10, 25770 Francois, France, Tel/Fax 011-33-1-48-350-756.

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US silence over the Afghan tragedy, why?

By Yama Jaweid Shamreiz

The Afghan people have been suffering for two decades from endless war and destruction. When the Soviets left in defeat in 1989, and when the puppet communist regime was overthrown in 1992, everyone expected an end to the Afghan's misery and a start to the reconstruction of the country and rehabilitation of the people. But unfortunately, that did not happen and the Afghans continued to suffer ever greater afflictions.

In the past eight years, all that had survived the Red Army was destroyed, the country sank into chaos, and the people now live in the most terrible economic and political conditions imaginable in modern times.

All this because some fanatic and barbaric groups, aided by foreign countries with their own once hidden and now exposed agendas, want to impose their will on the Afghan people. It started with Hekmatyar's complete destruction of Kabul and continues with the Taliban and their annihilation of all else that the Afghans hold near and dear.

Now while Pakistan's Pervez Musharraf explicitly stated his country's full backing of the Taliban militia, only a familiar silence echoes from Washington. But, that's not unexpected.

The US has been silent for the past eight years, and it is widely speculated that Washington's assistance to Islamabad indirectly helped to create the Taliban. This accusation against US foreign policy in the region also reverberates through the halls of the US Congress.

With the stirrings of Osama bin Laden, it was thought that US policy may change. An occasional ululation by US government officials is all that's happened; no significant or effective measures have been taken to completely address the Taliban problem, which goes far beyond Osama. Why?

We can venture to guess that the US still thinks that it has something to gain from a Taliban victory. The main reason may be that Washington is indirectly using the militia as a handy leverage against her rivals.

There are four regional and world powers who continue to insist on challenging America's sole superpower status: Russia, China, India and Iran. By a stroke of luck (for the US), the Taliban are helping to destabilize these very countries. The militia's mere existence and activities aid Kashmiri insurgents against India, secessionist Uighurs against China and the now Wahabi-infiltrated Chechens against the Russians, with whom the mainstream Muslim Chechens had come to peaceful terms. Central Asian opposition groups and Iranian dissidents, too, benefit from the Taliban's queer brand of hospitality.

On some levels, the US has a lot to gain from just the status quo, if not total Taliban triumph. If Washington has fallen for Islamabad's hogwash, then they expect fulfillment of their petroleum wishes and natural gas dreams. Meanwhile, the Afghan people continue to suffer.

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Prof. Elham reaches US

Phoenix, Sep 4 (Omaid): In an exclusive interview with Omaid Weekly, Prof. Rahim Elham said he and a number of family members have been granted asylum in the United States.

Prof. Elham was arrested by Pakistani authorities in mid-June after he denounced Islamabad for interfering in Afghanistan. Prof. Elham, once a prominent professor of Dari-Persian at Kabul University, was then escorted to the Pakistan-Afghanistan border for deportation to Afghanistan.

During an opportune time, Prof. Elham evaded his captors and hid in a ditch near the border region. He slowly made his way to the Islamabad office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. He was then in touch with the American Embassy and was soon granted asylum in the US, where he currently resides in Phoenix, Arizona.

Prof. Elham expressed special gratitude to the American Embassy in Pakistan for its assistance in granting him asylum in the US.

(Editor's note: The full version of Prof. Elham's interview has been published in Omaid Weekly's hard-copy edition.)

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Not a civil war

By Dr. Maliha Zulfacar

Summary of Dr. Zulfacar's article, submitted to OMAID WEEKLY. Continued from our previous issue.

I have traveled most of my life to different continents and regions but this trip was the riskiest of all. Until the last hour we were not sure to which part of Afghanistan we were being taken. At the hotel [in Dushanbe], an hour before the flight, we were told the destination was Taloqan and at the airport, we were told Panjsher.

It took two hours to get to Panjsher. Once there, it was a different feeling. It was HOME. I was returning back after 21 years of living as an immigrant in Europe and then in the US. The mountains, the roaring rivers, the trees, and the dust seemed unchanged. Yet, once we approached a village and became closer to the people, the pain, the agony, the torture of war, the disgust, and the helplessness were heart breaking.

To my surprise, walking in the village without the company of a male relative was not an issue. There were no restrictions regarding where we should walk or whom we could talk to.

The local women all talked about the human and financial burden of the ongoing war. Their sons, on whom they depend for farming activities, were on the frontline and their daughters have long passed their marriage age; no available young men with the necessary Mahr/dowry to wed them. The horrific living conditions of the internally displaced refugees under the blue colored UN-donated tents in the bitter cold winters and scorching hot summers were told and retold everywhere.

They all condemned the direct interference of Pakistan/Taliban. After a few days, it became obvious that by referring to the Taliban, they meant Pakistanis and other "foreigners"; when I asked specifically about these foreigners, they named Arabs, Chechens, and Chinese.

Contrary to most Afghans residing outside of Afghanistan, for those Afghans inside Afghanistan with whom I spoke, the conflict is not seen as a civil war. When they spoke of war , they did not mention or associate the Taliban with Pashtoons and the United Front with non-Pashtoons. Among those I interviewed, they said Pakistan's direct support of the Taliban was as clear and crucial in their survival as the Soviets' support of the Parcham and Khalq [communist parties].

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Massive Pak offensive falters, UF advances on Nahrin

September 4, Panjsher (Omaid): A massive assault on Taloqan by Pakistani-led forces was largely defeated by the United Front (UF), reports Parwan-province based Payam-e-Mujahid newspaper.

In a separate report, Omaid Weekly has learned that according to Mohammad Yunus Qanuni, a leading UF official, hundreds of Arab terrorists from Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaida organization aided the Pakistani-Taliban force, which is commanded by Pakistani Brigadier Allah-Nawaz, in today's fighting.

While the Pakistani-Taliban-Osama alliance (PTO) was foiled on four out of five fronts, the PTO advanced in one region where the battle was directly led by Brig. Allah-Nawaz. Brig. Allah-Nawaz was charged with Pakistani operations in Taloqan in late-August. He had previously served as Pakistan's commanding officer in the Kargil debacle.

Heavy fighting continues with a UF counter-offensive aimed at recapturing the lost posts.

A UF source told Payam-e-Mujahid that Pakistan flew twenty sorties over the region. Taloqan city-proper was struck twice, destroying four civilian structures and martyring 12 residents.

The PTO has thus far suffered a large number dead. Details are not yet available.

Meanwhile, the UF national resistance force continues its advance on Nahrin district in the province of Baghlan. At least eight additional military posts were captured by UF forces today. The UF is consolidating its positions around the center of Nahrin district after making significant gains on Thursday.

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