A war ... by men

BY the time this appears in print, that pile of rubble that is Afghanistan might have been pulverised into a finer mound of rubble by the relentless shower of American and British bombs. In a war in which there can be no winners, and many losers, pause for a minute and ask yourself — what will be the future of those faceless women you occasionally see on your television screen? If and when this war ends, who will speak for the women of Afghanistan?

In all the hours of footage on Afghanistan, there is little about women. Playing the leading roles in the current theatre of war within Afghanistan are men — regardless of whether they are Taliban or Northern Alliance. And on the other side, the Bush and Blair Brigade also consists mostly of men. Both sides speak the language of war. But what of the men, women and children who are the recipients of an endless spiral of violence? People who had no role in the events of September 11. And for whom there is little in the foreseeable future that presages peace.

On the BBC, ``Panorama'' had some chilling reminders of life under the Taliban — shots of women being beaten with a cane by a Taliban moral policeman because their ankles and wrists were showing from under the voluminous burqas, and of a woman being publicly executed. Even worse were the hauntingly beautiful faces of the children maimed by previous wars, by the estimated 10 million landmines that cover 725 sq. km. of the country. What a ghastly irony that the first civilian casualties were the four United Nations workers who were clearing these mines.

For several years before the current crisis enveloped all of us, an appeal on the fate of women in Afghanistan has been circulated by e-mail. It would turn up with great regularity; its contents told us what we had already heard about the terrible depredations that women in Afghanistan had to bear under the Taliban.

One of the groups spearheading the struggle for women's rights in that country is the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA). At this present juncture, when we see darkened screens and flickering lights to indicate that a country is being pounded virtually out of existence, it is instructive to visit the RAWA website (www.rawa.org).

The women behind this organisation launched their fight for women's rights long before the Taliban appeared on the horizon. Founded in 1977, RAWA campaigned for these rights even as their country was convulsed with violent struggles between different groups ending in the Soviet occupation in December 1979. This did not stop these brave women. Even when a number of them were arrested and their leader, Meena, was murdered, allegedly by KGB agents in Pakistan in 1987, they persisted. RAWA worked with women in Afghanistan as well as the millions in the refugee camps across the border in Pakistan. They ran schools, created jobs for women, ran a hospital and counselled their traumatised and displaced sisters.

The advent of the Taliban brought in a whole new dimension to their struggle. They could not operate freely in Afghanistan any more as women were forced to wear the burqa and banned from most jobs. But despite this they found ways to continue to work amongst Afghan women. Their website has a slide show that is not meant for the faint-hearted. It gives you an unedited view of life as it was in Afghanistan.

But the important point that RAWA makes is that those opposing Taliban are not much better in their attitude towards women. Nor do they respect human rights. While RAWA has emphasised its commitment to democracy and secularism, they point out that none of the groups fighting to displace the Taliban have any commitment to these values. In other words, the chances that women might be better off if the Taliban is replaced with another group is not at all a given in Afghanistan.

The 20 years of conflict that have preceded the current war have already taken a huge toll on the health — both physical and mental — of Afghan women living in the country and in refugee camps outside. According to a 1998 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (Vol. 280, August 5, 1998), women and children form three quarters of the refugee population which numbered 2.7 million in 1996. In addition, an estimated 1.2 million were internally displaced (that is they were refugees in Afghanistan) at the end of 1996. In other words, close to four million Afghans were refugees inside or outside their country in 1996.

The study surveyed 160 women, of whom half lived in Kabul and the other half in Pakistani refugee camps. It opens up a small window into the lives of these women. The majority of the women said that their mental and physical health had deteriorated during the two years they had lived in Kabul after the Taliban took over. A high 42 per cent were diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, 97 per cent suffered from depression and 86 per cent exhibited anxiety symptoms.

More than half these women were employed before the Taliban took over on September 26, 1996. After that, only one-third held on to their jobs. In the pre-Taliban days, 70 per cent of the teachers in Kabul, 50 per cent of the civil servants and 40 per cent of the physicians were women. All this changed almost overnight with the Taliban's ban on women working outside their homes. The loss of income had a direct impact on health and nutrition levels in many families.

Worse still, in September 1997 the government stopped women's access to health services in Kabul. Only one ``poorly equipped clinic'' was available to women. Following the intervention of the Red Cross, around 20 per cent of the beds in hospitals were kept for women. The study found that a large number of women refugees streaming into Pakistan mentioned the absence of medical care as one of the important reasons for leaving their country.

It is important that we know such facts. It is essential that we understand the conditions in which the majority of women lived. But it is also crucial that we realise that the future for the most vulnerable and abused in Afghan society, the women, is not at all guaranteed by a rain of bombs, by political machinations that bring about a change of government, or by painting Islam as being anti-women.

Afghan women were part of a Muslim society where they had rights. They were deprived of their democratic rights when the Soviets took over. They were deprived of their rights as women when the Taliban took over. Will they get their rights as human beings some day in the future?

KALPANA SHARMA

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