Canada and the World
Current Events with a Canadian Perspective
Last update
19 November 2010
Women’s Rights in Afghanistan
Women in Afghanistan endure a level
of suppression that most Westerners find offensive
During April 2009 the following incidents took place in Afghanistan:
- Women’s rights campaigner, Sitara Achakzai, was shot and killed in Kandahar;
- 19-
year- old Gul Pecha and her boyfriend, 21- year- old Abdul Aziz, ran away from their village to get married. They were captured, condemned to death by Islamic leaders, and executed in public; - Afghan President Hamid Karzai signed a new law governing Shia Muslim women that explicitly permitted husbands to rape their wives, and forbade women from working or attending school without the permission of their husbands; and,
- More than 200 women protesting against discrimination were confronted by men who cursed them and threw stones at them.
These events are symptoms of a deep prejudice against women in Afghanistan. For centuries
the male-
Women Join to Fight for Rights
In 1977, some brave women set up the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA). They seek to improve the human rights of their sisters and some of them have been killed for their efforts.
RAWA issued a statement on International Women’s Day (March 8,2008) outlining the daily reality for women in Afghanistan.
“Women are exchanged with dogs, girls are gang-
Malalai Joya (right) is a women’s rights activist and member of Afghanistan’s national
parliament. 
According to a report in The Age (Australia) She “has lived in hiding
for five years and never spends more than 24 hours at the same house… She sleeps,
eats, and breathes in the shadow of six heavily armed bodyguards and wears a burqa
to conceal her identity.”
Statistics Tell Grime Story
IRIN, the humanitarian news and analysis service of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, gives some grim statistics on the lives of women in Afghanistan:
- Every 30 minutes, an Afghan woman dies during childbirth;
- 87 percent of Afghan women are illiterate;
- 30 percent of girls have access to education in Afghanistan;
- 1 in every 3 Afghan women experience physical, psychological, or sexual violence;
- 44 years is the average life expectancy rate for women in Afghanistan; and,
- 70 to 80 percent of women face forced marriages in Afghanistan.
Troops Are Fighting for What?
As of July 2010, there were 150,000 foreign troops in Afghanistan, among them more than 2,500 Canadians.
One justification for this massive international effort is to improve human rights in the country, but, according to Judy Rebick that effort is not going well.
Ms. Rebick is the former head of Canada’s National Action Committee on the Status of Women. In an interview with the Globe and Mail (April 2009) she said: “How has the war helped women in Afghanistan? It hasn’t…We can’t bomb our way to equality.”
She says it would be better for Canada to support groups such as RAWA to bring about change from within.
However, historian Margaret MacMillan says pulling out of Afghanistan is not an option. In the same Globe and Mail article she says Canadian and other soldiers must stay and our politicians must be firmer with Afghanistan’s government in pressing for human rights improvements.
Image Credit
Afghan Kabul
Sources
“A Voice of Hope for Afghanistan’s Women.” Frud Bezhan, The Age (Australia), April 15, 2009.
“Q & A: Foreign Forces in Afghanistan.” BBC News, June 17, 2010.
“Plight of Afghan Women Prompts Fresh Debate.” Sandra Martin, Globe and Mail, April 17, 2009.
© Canada and the World, July 2010
All rights reserved
THE BURQA
Some women may chose to wear the burqa, the complete body-
To Western eyes the garment has become a symbol of the oppression of women that takes place in some Muslim countries.
Wearing the burqa in public has been banned in Belgium and may not be worn when accessing public services in France and the Netherlands.
Other countries, including Canada, are pondering restrictions on the wearing of the burqa.