WUNRN
NATO HOLDS CEREMONY CLOSING OFFICIAL AFGHANISTAN MISSION
http://in.reuters.com/article/2014/12/30/afghanistan-women-idINKBN0K81JE20141230
AFGHANISTAN – AS INTERNATIONAL COMBAT MISSION ENDS,
AFGHAN WOMEN CONCERNED ABOUT RETAINING GAINS, OPPRESSION VS. PROGRESS FOR
RIGHTS
Afghan Member
of Parliament Shukria Barakzai, speaks during an interview at a hospital after
having survived an attack on November, in Kabul December 27, 2014. Credit: Reuters/Mohammad Ismail
By
Jessica Donati - KABUL Dec 31, 2014
KABUL (Reuters) - No one
ever claimed responsibility after a suicide bomber rammed into the vehicle of
celebrated female parliamentarian Shukria Barakzai. She walked away from the
wreckage after the Nov. 16 blast that killed three civilians and wounded 20.
The Taliban often takes
responsibility for suicide bombings - it did so for one against the British
embassy that killed six people days later. Barakzai, 42, said Afghanistan's spy
agency had warned her before about threats to her life from the insurgent
group. But an investigation into the attack on the outspoken women’s rights
activist has led nowhere.
Barakzai, a tireless
campaigner for women's rights, has no shortage of potential enemies, including
powerful warlords, as Afghanistan's regional chieftains are known. “Our
Parliament is a collection of lords," Barakzai once famously said.
"Warlords, drug lords, crime lords.”
Barakzai was only a few
hundred metres from the Parliament building, her destination, when the
suicide bomber rammed into her armoured car.
A strong supporter of new
President Ashraf Ghani, Barakzai had been widely talked about as a candidate to
join his government, perhaps as education minister or the next women’s affairs
minister. Ghani has promised he will appoint four women in his cabinet.
Barakzai, who rose to
prominence when she ran underground schools for girls when the Taliban ruled
the country, says both the previous Afghan government and its Western
benefactors have failed to defend the hard-won rights of women.
"For me, what they do
to support women’s rights is just lip service, nothing more than that,” says
Barakzai, interviewed in hospital where she is recovering from burns to the
left side of her face and her left hand from the attack.
QUOTAS FOR WOMEN
The U.S.-led coalition
invaded Afghanistan in 2001 to oust the Taliban and stayed on, in part, to
build a western-style democracy, including legal safeguards for women. A quota
was mandated for women in public offices, such as parliament and provincial
councils. Earlier this year, however, conservative lawmakers rolled back the
quota reserved for women in provincial councils to 20 per cent from 25 per
cent.
Last Sunday marked the formal
end to the international combat mission in Afghanistan. And while huge progress
has been made getting millions of girls in school and putting women in
positions of formal authority, it has had "frustratingly little impact on
these power dynamics," the U.N.-backed Afghanistan Research and Evaluation
Unit said in a recent report.
"Today, women’s
rights are ... one of the feared losses shared by Afghans and the world as
international troops prepare to withdraw completely.”
World Bank data shows
Afghanistan still lags far behind even its impoverished neighbours in South
Asia. Only 16 percent of Afghan females above the age of 15 were active in the
labour force compared with 57 percent in Bangladesh and 27 percent in India. The
fertility rate in Afghanistan is 7.2 births per woman versus 3.1 for all of
South Asia. Only 14 percent of births in Afghanistan are attended by a skilled
health worker compared with 36 percent in South Asia. The literacy rate for
15-24 year-old women was 32 percent compared with 63 percent in neighbouring
Pakistan.
UNIVERSITY FOR GIRLS
Barakzai, a
parliamentarian the past decade, has campaigned against the practice of Afghan
men marrying multiple wives - her husband, who runs an oil company, took a second
wife without consulting her. She stresses the need for long-term investment in
education to compete seriously for jobs instead of aid programmes for
"workshops or seminars".
"We need a university
for girls," she says, explaining many families won't send girls to mixed
institutions. Barakzai was scornful about aid programmes that teach women about
rights or try to give them job skills.
"If you see their
projects, they are always the same. Empowering women by a seminar or workshop.
Or embroidery, tailoring," she laughs. "I am tired of these things.
Women's activists have
been lukewarm about a new $216 million United States Agency for International
Development (USAID) programme to support women's advancement. The five-year
program aims to help thousands of women "gain business and management
skills, supporting women’s rights groups and increasing the number of women in
decision-making positions," according to a U.S. embassy statement.
Noor Safi Gululai, one of
the few women in Afghanistan's High Peace Council, which is in charge of the
so-far fruitless effort to convince the Taliban to join peace talks, was
critical of such capacity-building efforts.
"I am afraid this
money will also go in the pockets of a few people," Gululai told Reuters.
"Rights will never be taught at conferences. I hope the President will
talk to USAID and have them use the money to establish good schools and
universities."
The U.S. Embassy in Kabul
declined to comment.