Translated with AI
In recent years, the UN has repeatedly lamented the chronically low level of participation of Afghan women and girls in decision-making bodies, but now this figure has reached absolute zero: not a single woman is represented in national and local government bodies. In addition, after the ban introduced in December 2024, soon no girl in Afghanistan will receive secondary or higher education, the press service of the Organization reports.
The findings are contained in a report released Tuesday by the gender equality agency UN Women, the most comprehensive study of women in Afghanistan since the Taliban returned to power in 2021.
“We have witnessed a deliberate and unprecedented assault on the rights, dignity and very lives of Afghan women and girls,” Sophia Calthorpe, head of UN Women’s humanitarian operations, said at a briefing in Geneva. “And yet, despite the almost total restrictions on their lives, Afghan women are not giving up.”
A report published by UN Women notes that while the Taliban regime has led to “unprecedented” gender inequality, the disparities existed long before 2021.
“The problem of gender inequality in Afghanistan did not begin with the Taliban,” Sophia Calthorpe said. “Their institutionalized discrimination is compounded by the deep-rooted barriers that already held Afghan women back.”
The report says Afghan women currently realize only 17 percent of their potential, and recent actions by the country's de facto authorities, including a ban on women's secondary education and increasingly stringent restrictions on their movement, will continue and possibly worsen the trend.
Displaced from the life of society
The systematic exclusion of women from society at all levels not only hinders progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and gender equality, but also exacerbates poverty and instability more broadly by making it difficult to diversify the economy’s labour force.
“Afghanistan’s greatest resource is its women and girls, but their potential remains untapped,” said UN Women Executive Director Sima Bacchus.
Currently, only 24 percent of women work in the public sector, compared to 89 percent of men. Women still tend to occupy low-paid jobs and are overwhelmingly responsible for all unpaid domestic work.
Lack of funding
The outlook for foreign aid in Afghanistan is increasingly bleak, with only 18 percent of the country’s 2025 humanitarian response plan funded. This is having a tangible impact on the situation on the ground, prompting leading UN agencies and their partners to call for urgent action and funds from the international community.
Women, girls and other vulnerable groups in Afghanistan are particularly vulnerable to lack of funding – the country has closed 300 feeding centres for malnourished mothers and their children and 216 gender-based violence centres, affecting more than a million women and girls.
“The choices we make now will show what we stand for as a global community,” said Sophia Calthorpe. “If the world tolerates the degradation of Afghan women and girls, it will send a message that the rights of women and girls around the world do not matter. But Afghan women have not given up, and neither will we.”
