KABUL – The Afghan Taliban, condemned for their conservative ideology, were surprisingly open with female delegates who attended peace talks in Qatar.
The Taliban also pledged support for women education and their right to work in male-dominated professions.
Women were brutally pushed to the shadows during the Taliban 1996-2001 regime in Afghanistan, denied basic human rights and not allowed to leave their homes without a male custodian.
But three women who were part of a 20-membered Afghan delegation that held informal peace talks with insurgent representatives in Qatar last weekend said they were unexpectedly receptive to their viewpoint.
Former MP and women rights activist Malalai Shinwari, who attended the talks, also said the Taliban representatives voiced support for female lawmakers and for the right of women to choose their own spouse.
“They paid close attention when I told them you made wearing the burqa compulsory, I used to see the world through small holes in the burqa, through a small window’,” Shinwari told media this week.
“I even told them the story of a woman in my village whose two sons died, one fighting for the government and the other for the Taliban. She is devastated after losing her sons,” she said.
Shinwari said that she went into the meeting expecting the insurgent delegates would not even greet her, but one elderly Taliban member with a white beard walked up to her and gently paid greetings .
It also remains unclear whether the Taliban members have the wider support of insurgent commanders who have waged a war against US-led forces for nearly 14 years.
“The Taliban often say one thing and does another. During the long conflict with the Afghan government, the Taliban have often attacked girls’ schools and teachers, and threatened and killed women rights activists and women in public life. These attacks continue,” she said in her statement.
Shinwari was accompanied by two young Afghan women who serve as defense lawyers for Taliban detainees.
“I told the Taliban representatives: ‘You didn’t let these two women go to school, but after your regime ended, they completed university, and today they are lawyers defending the Taliban in government prisons’,” she said.
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