Women Banned from Entering Zanda Banan Market in Herat
- Ariahn Raya
- 15 minutes ago
- 2 min read
Local sources in Herat say Taliban vice and virtue forces prevented women from entering Zanda Banan Market in Herat city on Monday (24 August). Women who spoke to Zan News say they were not allowed to enter the shopping centre even to buy clothes and essential items for their families.
Marila Pazhwak, a Herat resident who had gone to the market to buy clothes for her children, told Zan News that two vice and virtue officials and another Taliban member stopped her at the entrance.
She says: “Today I went to Zanda Banan Market to buy clothes for my two children, but two vice and virtue officials and another man who was also a Taliban member and was wearing the uniform of another department told me that women were not allowed to enter the market.”
Marila adds: “No matter how much I tried to persuade the Taliban to let me enter the market, they said, ‘You are a woman and you have no right to enter the market.’”
Meanwhile, Safia and Mahnaz, two other women in Herat, have also complained about humiliating and mocking treatment by the Taliban. They say they were not allowed to enter Zanda Banan Market despite wearing burqas.
They told Zan News: “Today we went together to buy clothes and shoes from Zanda Banan Market. It was afternoon when we arrived. The Taliban were standing at the entrance and told us that women were not allowed to enter the market.”
According to the two women, when they explained that they had come to shop, one Taliban member responded mockingly.
Mahnaz says: “We said we had come to shop, and one of the Taliban mockingly said, ‘Do you think other women come here for weddings?’”
She also says one Taliban member told them that restrictions on women could become even stricter in the coming days.
Mahnaz told Zan News: “They said that in a few days, you may no longer have the right to shop outside your home. What does a woman need to go shopping for? Go home, auntie, and stay there.”
Safia also says the treatment was “deeply upsetting and painful” for her.
She says: “I was very upset today when I saw that the Taliban would not even allow us to shop in the market. The Taliban have truly made life difficult, and we women feel as though we are living in a cage and a prison.”
The report of women being prevented from entering the shopping centre comes as the Taliban have imposed widespread restrictions on the education, employment, movement and public participation of women and girls since returning to power.
Markets and shopping centres provide many of the everyday necessities of families. Preventing women from entering them, even to buy items needed for themselves and their children, extends Taliban restrictions into yet another area of women’s daily lives in Herat.
