Taliban chief tells Afghan officials to enforce new morality law

Published September 2, 2024
Afghan girls from a madrassa walk along a road in Balkh province’s Sholgara district on Sunday. — AFP
Afghan girls from a madrassa walk along a road in Balkh province’s Sholgara district on Sunday. — AFP

Taliban supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada has ordered Afghan officials to enact a sweeping new morality law curtailing women’s rights and enshrining an austere vision of Islamic society.

Taliban authorities last month announced the law, which includes rules that women’s faces, bodies and voices should be “covered” outside the home, among 35 articles dictating behaviour and lifestyle.

While many of the measures have been informally enforced since the Taliban’s takeover in 2021, their formal codification sparked an outcry from the international community and rights groups.

Akhundzada told civil and military officials “they should implement … the law of promoting virtue in society”, a statement by the Information and Culture Department of Faryab province said.

The reclusive Akhundzada rules by decree from a hideout in southern Kandahar province but made the order in a rare trip to northern Faryab last week, according to the statement released on Sunday.

The new law prohibits women from raising their voices in public and requires them to cover their entire body and face if they need to leave their homes, which they should only do “out of necessity”.

Men’s behaviour and dress are also strictly regulated under the edict, which instructs them not to wear shorts above the knee or to trim their beards closely.

Other parts of the law dictate prayer attendance as well as bans on keeping photos of living beings, homosexuality, animal fighting, playing music in public and non-Muslim holidays.

The law sets out graduated punishments that morality police are empowered to dole out, from verbal warnings to threats, fines and detentions of varying lengths.

The head of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, Roza Otunbayeva, called the law a “distressing vision for Afghanistan’s future”.

Akhundzada was in Faryab on Friday after visiting Badghis province in his first official visit to northern Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover, Faryab’s Department of Information and Culture head Shamsullah Mohammadi told AFP.

Opinion

Editorial

Smog hazard
Updated 05 Nov, 2024

Smog hazard

The catastrophe unfolding in Lahore is a product of authorities’ repeated failure to recognise environmental impact of rapid urbanisation.
Monetary policy
05 Nov, 2024

Monetary policy

IN an aggressive move, the State Bank on Monday reduced its key policy rate by a hefty 250bps to 15pc. This is the...
Cultural power
05 Nov, 2024

Cultural power

AS vital modes of communication, art and culture have the power to overcome social and international barriers....
Disregarding CCI
Updated 04 Nov, 2024

Disregarding CCI

The failure to regularly convene CCI meetings means that the process of democratic decision-making is falling apart.
Defeating TB
04 Nov, 2024

Defeating TB

CONSIDERING the fact that Pakistan has the fifth highest burden of tuberculosis in the world as per the World Health...
Ceasefire charade
Updated 04 Nov, 2024

Ceasefire charade

The US talks of peace, while simultaneously arming and funding their Israeli allies, are doomed to fail, and are little more than a charade.