By Matin Mehrab and Freshta Ghani
Murtaza and Farahnaz thought they’d prepared for every eventuality. Knowing that the Taliban forbid relationships of any sort outside of marriage, the couple carefully planned what they’d say and do if they were interrogated by the Taliban. They’d tell the authorities that they were officially engaged and memorized names and details about each other’s families.
Then, in early September 2022, they were stopped at a Taliban checkpoint while in his car in Herat city. Their carefully rehearsed story wasn’t enough. The Taliban demanded to see a document proving that Murtaza, then 26, and Farahnaz, then 22, were engaged and then detained them when they couldn’t produce the document. “I was locked up in a men’s cell and Farahnaz was in the women’s cell,” explains Murtaza to Zan Times. “Our families didn’t know about our imprisonment, but the Taliban called our families. I was very worried about Farahnaz. During the arrest she was very scared and her hands and feet were shaking.” Murtaza says that he was beaten twice by a Taliban gunman while in detention.
The Taliban ordered Farahnaz to undergo a virginity test to ensure that she and Murtaza had not had sex. The authorities also wanted Murtaza and Farahnaz to be married in prison but her father opposed the idea. “My family paid a municipal councillor to talk to the Taliban and release us. He probably shared that money with the Taliban. If we didn’t pay, my girlfriend and I would have been put on the list to be flogged in public,” says Murtaza. Finally, they were released after 48 hours in prison.
The couple hasn’t seen each other since or had direct contact. Two weeks after their arrest, she was able to send just one message from her sister’s mobile phone in the middle of the night while her family was asleep. She told her boyfriend about her condition, including that her father had beat her after she was released from prison. “We have no way of communicating anymore,” he says.
While traditional Afghan families never allowed their daughters to have relationships of any sort with boys, young couples used to meet in public areas, away from their homes. But since the Taliban regained power and imposed even harsher restrictions on women, many young lovers are heartbroken, crying for the modicum of freedom that they once enjoyed.
By May 2022, Saeeda and her boyfriend had been in a relationship for two years. But it was hard to get together after the Taliban took over. So, after spending six months apart, they decided to meet in a restaurant in Herat. They were simply chatting at a table when they were confronted by a Taliban vice and virtue patrol. “They shouted at us, asking, ‘What is your relationship with each other sitting here?’ They did not allow us to speak and dragged us into the Taliban Ranger,” Saeeda tells Zan Times.
After Saeeda was taken to the police station, the woman interrogator shouted obscenities and abuse at Saeeda. “I was forced to say that I am friends with this boy and we want to get married,” she recounts. After 24 hours in detention, including spending a night in a foul-smelling room with several other women who were imprisoned on theft and drug charges, her family got her released. “When I went home, I was beaten by my father and brothers for several days. They said that I had tarnished their reputation,” she tells Zan Times.
Saeeda’s boyfriend was also released but their relationship never recovered. After pressure from both families, they ended it.
The stories of Saeeda as well as Murtaza and Farahnaz are increasingly common. To see how life under the Taliban is affecting young love, Zan Times has interviewed eight people, including five women and three men, in Herat, Kandahar, Samangan, Ghor, and Jawzjan provinces. One of the young women spoke for them when she said, “The Taliban cannot understand people who are in love, because they do not know love.”
The Taliban has not only outlawed relationships outside of marriage but also severely prosecutes anyone whom they believe have broken their rules. From September 13, 2022 to January 17, 2023, at least 142 people were publicly flogged in 13 provinces of Afghanistan for the crime of relationships outside marriage, of which 52 were women. Though Zan Times compiled that data from reports in the news media, the actual number of arbitrary arrests and violent punishments is believed to be much higher.
In a July 2022 report, Amnesty International stated that the Taliban forced women in their prisons to confess that they had an extramarital relationship with men. “They beat them at the police station,” one Taliban prison staff member explained to Amnesty International. “After they beat them, they usually keep [them at the police station] for two or three weeks. In this time, the wounds heal, and only bruises remain … The women say they were beaten to force them to accept that they did something and to put their fingerprints on the paper. They say, ‘Even if we didn’t to it, we were forced to accept we did zinna [adultery].”
In the Amnesty International report, a female prisoner was quoted as saying that she was tortured with electric whips to confess that she had a romantic relationship with a man: “They started giving me electric shocks … on my shoulder, face, neck, anywhere they could … They were trying to use it on my hands, because it caused more pain … I was not able to breathe properly. They were calling me a prostitute, a bitch and things like this.”
Even with such dangers, young couples risk seeing each other. Rukhsar and Ibrahim have seen each other twice in the last seven months. Every time the couple meet in their home province of Jawzjan, they wear engagement rings and try to behave in such a way that no one suspects them. “Before the Taliban came to power, Ibrahim and I used to meet very easily in coffee shops and restaurants. Sometimes, under the pretext of studying, I would go and see Ibrahim; he would help me in my studies. The atmosphere was very good,” explains Rukhsar. “But now we are very afraid.” While the couple want to get married, her mother is against it.
The restrictions imposed on women, especially now that they are banned from higher education, has made it even harder to find and keep relationships. Nadima, 23, has not seen her boyfriend for a year. She was a student at Samangan State University and three years ago she developed a relationship with a classmate named Omar. After the Taliban returned, Omar and his family moved to Parwan province, making it impossible for them to see each other. “Omar says, ‘I will come to Samangan to see you’ but I can’t leave home to see him. I am afraid that if the Taliban see us, they will arrest us.”
She misses the days with Omar before the Taliban returned. Every now and again, she sheds tears as she remembers the past: “I miss Omar so much. What can I do other than cry?”
The names of all those interviewed have been changed for their protection.
