UNITED NATIONS, Sep 24 : Afghan women earned the right to vote more than a century ago, but today, under Taliban rule, they are practically erased from public life, Academy Award-winning actress Meryl Streep, who is also a prominent advocate for women’s rights, said at the United Nations on Monday.
“Today in Kabul a female cat has more freedom than a woman. A cat may go sit on her front stoop and feel the sun on her face. She may chase a squirrel into the park. A squirrel has more rights than a girl in Afghanistan today, because the public parks have been closed to women and girls by the Taliban,” she said
Ms. Streep joined several prominent Afghan women activists at the event “The Inclusion of Women in the Future of Afghanistan” on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) in New York.
“A bird may sing in Kabul, but a girl may not and a woman may not in public. This is extraordinary. This is a suppression of the natural law. This is odd,” she said, referring to the Taliban’s latest edict for Afghan women, banning their voices and presence from public spaces.
The meeting was co-hosted by Ireland, Indonesia, Switzerland and Qatar, in partnership with the Women’s Forum on Afghanistan, which works to ensure that Afghan women are included in any dialogue and decision-making at the international level on the future of their country.
It came on the eve of the annual debate in the General Assembly, and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres took time out of his packed schedule to uphold international solidarity with Afghan women.
“We will continue to amplify the voices of Afghan women and call for them to play a full role in the country’s life, both inside its borders and on the global stage,” the UN chief said.
Guterres vowed that the UN “will never allow gender-based discrimination to become normalized anywhere in the world,” adding “what is happening in Afghanistan can be compared with some of the most egregious systems of oppression in recent history.”
The Taliban have been slashing away at women’s and girls’ rights since returning to power in August 2021.
The Afghan authorities have issued more than 70 fatwas, directives and decrees, including limiting girls to primary-level education, banning women from most professions and prohibiting them from using parks, gyms and other public places.
“We meet in perilous times, and it is heart wrenching to be a woman and never as much as now in Afghanistan,” said Margot Wallstrom, a former Swedish foreign minister and chair of the Women’s Forum on Afghanistan who served as the moderator.
“The latest Taliban edict wants to silence women, including singing, and make them invisible. Not here at the UN though. Today, we will let their voices and their concerns be heard.”
Ms.Streep also introduced a short version of the documentary film ‘The Sharp Edge of Peace’, which follows the only woman on the Afghan Government team negotiating with the Taliban in talks held in Doha, Qatar, in 2020.
She recalled that Afghan women received the right to vote in 1919, well before their counterparts in her homeland, the United States.
“The way that this culture, this society, has been upended, is a cautionary tale for the rest of the world,” said Ms. Streep noting that even animals in Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul, have more freedom than women and girls there.
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