In the migrant camp at Islam Qala, the border between Iran and Afghanistan, women stand in clouds of dust, women who no longer have any hope of returning to the country nor any way to continue their lives on the other side of the border; women who have lived for years in the margins of Iranian society.

In a country where the Taliban have imposed the harshest restrictions on women’s lives, some Afghan women are striving to open a new window of hope and resistance by organizing women-only tourism tours.

The Taliban’s Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation has announced that in just the past three months, nearly 1.8 million Afghan migrants have been forcibly returned from Iran.

Local sources in western Kabul report that Taliban forces, on Wednesday morning, July 30, arrested a number of women and girls in the Qala-e Naw and 20-meter Road areas of Dasht-e Barchi for not being accompanied by a male guardian (mahram).