WUNRN
AFGHANISTAN ALARM OVER SAFETY OF WOMEN IN KUNDUZ SINCE TALIBAN RETURN
Womens
rights group struggle to protect women and staffers at Afghan domestic violence
shelters
By Halima Kazem - October 1, 2015
As
Afghan government forces fight to regain
full control of the northern city of Kunduz, which the Taliban
seized on Monday, womens rights groups are desperately trying to protect women
staying at shelters and the staffers who run them.
Our Kunduz
shelter and office has been looted, and we are trying to get everyone to Kabul.
We are very worried that the Taliban will find them, said Najia Nasim, the
director of Women for Afghan Women (WAW) in Kabul.
She said
that 15 shelter staff members are still in Kunduz waiting to be moved out and
that she has lost phone contact with them. She said the five women and four
children who lived in WAW shelters in the city were moved early Tuesday morning
by shelter staffers, who drive them to a neighboring province and then flew
them to Kabul, the capital.
WAW runs 11
womens shelters and four childrens centers in Afghanistan, which is has long
been considered one of the most dangerous countries for women, especially under
the hard-line Taliban regime from 1996 to 2001.
Our files
have been burned to ensure the anonymity and safety of persons associated with
WAW. But the Taliban are relentless and are actively seeking information about
WAW staff, gravely endangering our staff and their families in [Kunduz]
province, said Manizha Naderi, WAWs executive director, in an email.
The Afghan
government announced early Thursday morning that Afghan security forces
regained control of the city of Kunduz but that residents and journalists in
Kunduz are reporting on social media that fighting continues and that the
Taliban still controls some pockets of the city. Some fighters are reportedly
hiding out in residents homes.
The
shelters offer Afghan women who are victims of violence and their children a
safe place to stay, counseling services and educational programs.
Noting
reports by the Afghan Human Rights Commission showing increasing levels of
violence against women in recent years, womens shelters have come under attack
by some religious leaders, radical groups and government officials. They say
the shelters go against Afghan traditions of privately handling family disputes
and encourage women and girls to run away from home.
16 February
2015 - Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) announced
that more than 4,250 cases of violence against women have been recorded in the
past nine months. A number of analysts have said that the main factor behind the
growing issue of violence against women is the non-implementation of law.
..
Womens
rights advocates say they fear that shelters are being targeted by the Taliban,
which wants to once again impose severe restrictions on womens freedoms,
including access to social services and education. They say women in the
shelters are at high risk of being kidnapped, raped or killed by Taliban
fighters.
Horia
Mosadiq, an Afghanistan researcher for Amnesty International in London, said
she has received reports that shelters, hospitals, homes and offices have been
attacked.
We have
reports of rape of the family members of Afghan Local Police soldiers and
commanders, killing of people who work for the security forces and breaking
into hospital, including maternity hospital, where they raped and killed two
midwives and beaten others, she said.
Amnesty International
reported that the Taliban had targets. Women human rights defenders from
Kunduz spoke of a hit list being used by the Taliban to track down activists
and others and described how fighters had raped and killed numerous civilians,
it said in a statement released on Thursday.
Afghan
Ministry of Interior spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said in a press release Thursday
that 150 Taliban fighters were killed by Afghan National Security Forces from
Wednesday to Thursday morning in Kunduz.
Mosadiq
said that the Afghan government has not provided civilians, including the
womens shelters, any help in evacuating. There are no reports of the Afghan
government evacuating any civilians from Kunduz, and Sediqqi couldnt be
reached for comment.
Thats why
Naderi sent out an urgent email to WAW supporters on Wednesday urgently asking
for donations to help the group charter planes in Kabul and fly them to Kunduz
to evacuate its staffers.
The Kunduz
airport was taken over by Taliban fighters on Monday, and its unclear whether
the Afghan government has retaken it.
Right now we are not sure when we will be able to reopen the Kunduz shelter, said Nasim.