Reports say at least 35 young people were killed and more than eighty wounded when a suicide bomber targeted a school in Kabul, Afghanistan. Local journalist Bilal Sarwary says the number of dead is much higher. He reported that one hundred had been counted so far.
It was an empty promise. This was what undercover journalist and filmmaker Ramita Navai said about the promise of the Taliban to defend women’s rights according to Islamic law.
Islamic law is seen to implement God’s commands for Muslims. Sharia, which means “the way,” are laws that represent conduct that is intended to guide Muslims.
A Sikh temple in Kabul, Afghanistan, was attacked, leaving a Sikh devotee and a Taliban security officer dead and seven injured. The attack was proclaimed to be retaliation for the comments made by India's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.
Ajmal Haqiqi, an Afghan model and YouTuber, found himself in a difficult situation with the Taliban. Haqiqi and his colleagues had allegedly insulted Islam in one of their recent videos that resulted in their arrests.
On May 22, 2022, came another attack on women’s rights in Afghanistan. The Taliban reissued an old law requiring women to cover their faces, this time specifying news anchors. Proof of this new law was seen on-air as female news anchors are seen on TV with masks just showing their eyes across all popular news channels in the country.
On April 3, the Taliban announced that they would ban the cultivation of opium poppies. A spokesman from the Taliban warned that farmers might be “jailed and their crops burned if they harvested poppy,” DW reported.
The Taliban has ordered government officials to wear a beard and adhere to dress codes, as provided by their hardline interpretation of Islam. On Monday, March 28, representatives of the Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice visited government offices, enforcing the new order.
The Taliban backtracked on its announcement of opening schools to girls. Anger and frustration swept Afghanistan after the education ministry suddenly announced that female students are not allowed back in school, indefinitely.
