The Taliban forbid women from hearing each other’s voices
Amid growing internal divisions over enforcing the new restrictions, the Taliban’s Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice launched a campaign to implement a new law against women being heard by other women.
Even before this law, the Taliban had issued dozens of orders to limit social interactions, political activities, work, entertainment, and other civil rights, many aimed at women. This law tightens restrictions further and provides more detailed mechanisms for enforcement.
Recent additions to Taliban restrictions — banning women’s images and considering their voices as “awrat” (a term implying concealment) — have reportedly led to internal disagreements within the group. Campaigns led by Khalid Hanafi and his notorious vice and virtue ministry have focused on these two new restrictions. Recently, television broadcasts have been halted in some provinces, including Takhar, Badghis, Kandahar, and Helmand, with the the state television station renamed Radio Voice of Sharia.
Khalid Hanafi, who is responsible for enforcing the Taliban leader’s anti-human rights orders through his ministry, recently visited some provinces, including Laghman, Nangarhar, and Logar. In meetings with local Taliban officials, mullahs, and local elders, he explained Mullah Hibatullah’s edicts. In an audio recording, Hanafi can be heard stating that the Taliban’s decision on women’s voices is final: “Women cannot recite aloud, nor can they sing songs or chants. Period!”
Citing religious texts, he said, “When an adult woman prays and another adult woman passes in front of her, she is not permitted to pray out loud. So how could she be allowed to sing?” Khalid Hanafi informed attendees that the law on the propagation of virtue would be implemented gradually “and we believe, with God’s help, that we will eventually succeed.”
The Taliban’s opportunism
Khalid Hanafi stated that no one expected the Taliban to prevail during the war with NATO and the U.S., but “the saddened, impoverished, and homeless Afghans” succeeded against the U.S., 47 countries that were directly involved in the war, and 57 countries that indirectly supported it, thereby “defeating the infidel world by God’s will.”
Some view the confidence shown by figures like Khalid Hanafi as a result of political ignorance, while others see it as a calculated Taliban tactic that relies on both overt and covert agreements between their leaders and regional and global powers to more effectively suppress their opponents. In the past three years, the Taliban have pursued a dual policy of anti-Americanism and promoting jihadism. On one hand, they indoctrinate children and teenagers in schools, orphanages, and madrasas with fanaticism while also suppressing urban culture. On the other hand, they seek recognition from the U.S. and its allies and receive substantial weekly financial aid from the “infidel world.”
This dual policy was reflected in the Doha Agreement, where the Taliban pledged that they would not fight against U.S. interests and forces after regaining power and would prevent Afghan soil from being used against U.S. interests. In exchange, “the United States and its allies pledged to refrain from interfering in Afghanistan’s internal affairs.” Therefore, the ongoing tragedy in Afghanistan is not unrelated to the agreement between the U.S. and its allies with the Taliban.
Now, a pressing question arises among Taliban opponents and the Afghan people bearing the brunt of Taliban oppression: in a situation where the U.S. has pledged non-interference in Afghanistan’s internal affairs and provides financial, intelligence, and political support to the Taliban, can the calls from human rights organizations or even United Nations resolutions and reports help save the Afghan people from the Taliban’s inhumane policies? As long as the education, work, and freedom of Afghan citizens are not used as a benchmark for powerful countries like the U.S. to support or collaborate with the Taliban, will the group retreat from its inhumane policies?
Backed by the agreement with the U.S. and indifference to the U.N.
The Taliban have repeatedly stated that they adhere to no rules in their internal policies other than the edicts of Mullah Hibatullah. In response to reports from UNAMA (United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan) and human rights organizations, they have always reacted with silence, denial, or anger.
On September 18, Roza Otunbayeva, the U.N. secretary-general’s special representative for Afghanistan, reported to the Security Council that the Taliban’s enactment of the virtue and vice law has weakened her and her organization’s efforts to open a “new chapter of more meaningful dialogue.” She noted that the new law imposes “some of the most severe restrictions” on the Afghan people and sends a negative political message about genuine engagement.
Otunbayeva stated that the new law grants excessive powers to the Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice. Apparently emboldened by his ministry’s growing powers and increasingly maneuvering against internal and external opposition, Khalid Hanafi responded to UNAMA’s criticisms during a speech in Logar province a week after Otunbayeva’s report was published. He stated that the Taliban are protectors of women’s rights and claimed that the Taliban’s enemies seek to exploit the issue of women. He cited Mullah Hibatullah’s six-point decree, which describes inheritance rights and prohibits Bad [arrange marriages for settling a dispute between families and tribes]. He also claimed that his ministry has helped 20,000 women obtain their inheritance rights over the past three years.
The Taliban do not recognize women’s property rights, view women as lacking the capacity for independent decision-making, and do not permit them to travel without a male guardian, yet they claim to have helped women secure inheritance rights. In a society where women lack property rights, independence, and freedom of movement and education, the Taliban’s emphasis on the right to inheritance reduces women’s rights to mere sustenance and clothing; such decrees seem to support women’s rights on the surface but instead reinforce their dependence on men.
Khalid Hanafi, born in 1971 in Nuristan province and educated in Pakistani madrasas, is now a key ally of Mullah Hibatullah in the Taliban’s internal power struggles. The Taliban refer to him with the honorific title of “Sheikh,” like Mullah Hibatullah and several other senior mullahs.
Reports indicate that Hanafi had close ties with the Haqqani network in the past, though he now stands with Mullah Hibatullah in internal disputes, including on issues like banning images and closing girls’ schools; policies that Haqqani views detrimental to the Taliban’s rule. Recently, disagreements between Mullah Hibatullah and Sirajuddin Haqqani on shutting down television broadcasts and banning live images in the media surfaced when an audio recording of Jalaluddin Haqqani, Sirajuddin’s father, was released in which he defended the need for images in jihad. At the same time, an audio recording from Mullah Hibatullah condemning the publication of images was issued to the media. In that recording, Mullah Hibatullah cited “Mullah Kifayatullah Sahib in Kifayat al-Mufti,” deeming the depiction of human images, even for prayer instruction, was impermissible.
Just as Mullah Hibatullah and Jalaluddin Haqqani each cite contradictory religious stories from Islamic books to justify their political decisions on publishing images, sharia serves merely as a political tool in other inhumane rulings by extremist groups like the Taliban. Fundamentalists always use religion to serve their political and economic interests.
Younus Negah is a researcher and writer from Afghanistan who is currently in exile in Turkey.
