Support Afghanistan’s women

The current situation facing women and anyone else who resists the Taliban is dire — the Taliban are well-known for their human rights abuses, ranging from public beatings to televised beheadings. Moreover, this is an absolute tragedy for the lives of millions of women left in Afghanistan; under Taliban rule, they cannot go to school, receive an education or even leave their homes by themselves.

The plight of women under Taliban rule really struck a chord with me because it is unfathomable how women in the 21st Century could be denied the same opportunities and freedoms that I had taken for granted all my life.

Since I was a little girl, I was given countless opportunities to succeed in various fields, from athletic to academic. As I have grown older and assumed more responsibility, I have strived to broaden opportunities for women in the UK with the organisations I volunteer for.

From 1996 to 2001, the Taliban held power over roughly three-quarters of Afghanistan and enforced a strict interpretation of Sharia or Islamic law. To the general population, the Taliban and their allies committed massacres against Afghan civilians, denied UN food supplies to 160,000 starving civilians, and conducted a policy of scorched earth, burning vast areas of fertile land and destroying tens of thousands of homes. Culturally, they banned activities and media including instrumental music, paintings, photography, and movies that depicted people or other living things.

But perhaps the most egregious effect the Taliban had was on women. The Taliban prevented girls and young women from attending school banned women from working jobs outside of healthcare (male doctors were prohibited from treating women) and required that women be accompanied by a male relative and wear a burqa at all times when in public. If women broke certain rules, they were publicly whipped or executed.

Those strict rules meant that women became totally dependent on their male relatives for their survival. Women without male relatives were, therefore, subject to…