Woman in Afghanistan
I’m back at work after three eventful weeks on holiday from the Army. I’ve realised that a change in scenery is a must for any soldier’s sanity and I’ve come back feeling on top of the world, until today. Having worked an eleven hours day, mainly in the office, I’ve come home with a heavy head and light fever. It’s snowing outside and there’s a 15 degree difference from my time zone last week.
For the first time this week, I through myself on the coach as soon as I got in, I just about made it to the local grocery store beforehand and noticed that Enköping is pitch black and empty when the central shops shut.
There was a programme about women in Afghanistan on television tonight. Mainly filmed in Kabul, it is not the sort of environment I picture my colleagues placed in Afghanistan spending their time. Kabul is twice the size of Stockholm and has an international airport.
Only 10 percent of the women living in Afghanistan know how to read and write. According to the TV show, this is an effect of the 20 years of Taliban rule, forbidding women to go to school. Talibans continue to burn female schools, but they haven’t been in power since 2001, when US troops invaded Kabul on 7 October.
Despite of the power change, 90 percent of the women in Afghanistan today are abused in their homes. It's the world’s most dangerous country for a woman, and due to the domestic violence – a man in a tie is just as dangerous to a woman as a Taliban man.
Funnily enough, the Talibans used to be known as “freedom fighters" by Reagan’s anticommunist government in the 80s. Back then, the Talibans, or Mujahiddin groups, were fighting against the Soviet Union, who occupied Afghanistan in 1979. Several Mujahiddin groups were established with major support from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, who favoured the most extreme of the Mujahiddin commanders – ensuring that the most fanatical groups were also the best trained and armed.
68 women were put in the Afghan parliament in 2001 as a symbolic gesture. Each day these women drive to work with two armed guards in their car – they live under constant security threat.
The life expectancy of a woman in Afghanistan is 44 years. She is often forced into marriage before the age of 16, sold, or traded for sheep, or opium. Many women are not allowed to leave their homes without their husbands, or covered in a burqa. Men may be free in Afghanistan. Women are not.
The journalist finished the TV programme by asking one Afghan woman if it hadn’t been more calm and safe in the country whilst the Talibans were in power – compared to the last ten years of war? The woman replied with grace, wisdom and strength:
“It’s peaceful in the cemetery, but do you see any life there?”
