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Photo: HamidKarzai/X Former Afghan President Hamid Karzai, in a post sharing photos from his son Mirwais Karzai’s graduation and his daughter Malalai’s completion of primary school, has once again emphasized the importance of education for Afghan children, especially girls. In the photos published on his official Facebook page on Thursday (May 29), Karzai is seen with his family attending the graduation ceremony of Mirwais from the Afghan-Turk school. His wife, Zeenat Karzai, is also seen in the photos — an image of her appearing in public after many years. In the caption, Karzai mentions Mirwais’s high school graduation and announces that his daughter Malalai has completed her primary education. He added that she is “determined and ready” to continue her studies at higher levels. He also expressed hope that Malalai and other Afghan girls will be able to study inside the country up to grade twelve and then pursue their dreams at university, eventually serving their families and nation. Although Karzai did not directly refer to the current situation in the country, his remarks come at a time when the Taliban have banned girls in Afghanistan from attending school beyond grade six and have severely restricted their participation in public life.

Photo: Stefanie Glinski / The Telegraph "The Taliban, with their mine, not only amputated both of my legs, but also severed my ties with my family and society..."   "Leaving aside the views of ordinary people, it was my own parents' mindset that caused me to visit home only once in twelve years, for just two hours, before returning to the nursing home for people with disabilities. I will never return again..."   "Not having legs is not my greatest pain. It is the humiliating looks and words of people, calling me crippled and limping, and hundreds of other things that increase my suffering..."   These are the quotes of three women and girls with physical disabilities, whose stories have been highlighted by Zan TV in a report about the situation of these women and girls in Afghan society.   Women and girls with physical disabilities say that they not only suffer from the loss of their body parts, but also endure severe depression and psychological distress.   Sitara, a star hidden behind the cloud of sorrow for what she has lost, is one of these women. Twelve years ago, while traveling from her father's house to the city of Herat, she lost both of her legs in a Taliban landmine explosion. She now spends her days and nights with her three small children in a damp and old room.   She speaks with sighs and sorrow about her suffering, from her physical disability to the loss of family ties and the lack of food to fill her children's hungry stomachs.   "Twelve years ago, the Taliban, with their mine, not only amputated both of my legs, but also severed my ties with my family and society. Even my own parents no longer see me as their daughter. The last time I was a guest at my father's house was twelve years ago. On our way back, the vehicle hit a mine. I did not understand anything else. When I opened my eyes, I found myself in the hospital, my clothes soaked in blood."   According to Sitara, the Taliban's planted mine not only caused the loss of her legs, but also led her closest family members to cut ties with her and leave her in isolation.   Sitara says that at first, her friends and relatives were with her, but in less than six months, even her parents distanced themselves from her. Nearly ten years have passed, and her parents have not checked on her at all.   "At first, only my father and mother stayed by my side. But after six months, even they became distant. They said, 'What should we do with this crippled one?' Little by little, they abandoned me. Now it has been nearly ten years that I have heard nothing from them, and they have not asked about me."   She says that she has not only been rejected by society, her sister, brother, father, and mother, but also by her husband, who was the closest person to her. Four years ago, with the return of the Taliban, he left the house and abandoned unlucky Setareh and their three children in the city of Herat.   "It has been four years since my husband left the house, and I have no news of him. I live in this rented house. It is very hard when my children go to sleep hungry at night and cry from hunger until morning."   Sitara says that although she has no legs, she still goes to her neighbors in search of a piece of bread and washes their clothes and dishes in exchange for dry bread.   She adds that the harsh words of people in the community and her neighbors on one hand, and the lack of financial means to meet her basic needs on the other hand, along with her loneliness and having no guardian, have caused her to suffer from severe depression.   "Isn't it enough to have one sorrow? I must find bread for my children. When I go out, people laugh at me. When I go to a neighbor's house, they say a beggar has come. My father, mother, and husband have abandoned me. Who should I turn to? I have gone mad, I am mentally ill. What more can I say and to whom?"   Sitara is not the only one living in this miserable condition. Mahnaz, a 27-year-old girl, is another. Fourteen years ago, she became paralyzed in both legs and her lower back due to a traffic accident in the city of Tehran, Iran.   She has a bitter and similar story to Sitara's life narrative. Mahnaz says that after returning to Afghanistan, not only did people in society look at her with contempt, but even her own parents did the same. This caused her to leave home, and for the past twelve years, she has spent her days and nights in a care center for people with disabilities.   "We were going to a wedding. It has been almost fourteen years since the accident. The car we were in crashed and overturned. All members of my family were with me. Three of us were injured. But my injury remained forever. I am paralyzed from the waist down and in both legs."   The tears of loneliness and being rejected by her family no longer allow Mahnaz to continue. She pauses for a moment and then continues speaking with teary eyes and a broken voice.   "Ordinary people's opinions aside, it was the mindset of my own parents that made me go home only once in twelve years, and even then I stayed for just two hours. I returned to the care center and will never go back again. When I was at home, my mother used to say we cannot go to weddings or gatherings with you because people will laugh at us, saying your daughter is crippled."   According to Mahnaz, she has endured many hardships because of the attitudes of people and her closest family members.   "My father used to say he had no money for my treatment. In the end, with the help of a friend, I registered at the care center. In the second year, I went home but stayed only for two hours. I saw that the same attitude toward me still existed, so I returned."   Mahnaz says that after the Taliban came to power, she was deprived of attending university and is now suffering from psychological illnesses.   "The only hope I had left was to go to university and study computer science. But now, there is no hope left for life. I have thought many times about committing suicide, but I am afraid of its sin."   Shamila is another girl with a physical disability who, according to her, contracted polio during infancy and now lives alone in a rented house.   She recounts the bitterness of her life as follows: "When I was two years old, my father passed away. When I was four, my mother remarried. I lived with my grandfather, but unfortunately, when I turned fifteen, he also passed away. The only person I had left was my sister, who was married. I lived with them for a year, but I noticed that my sister’s husband looked at me inappropriately, so I was forced to rent a house and live alone."   Shamila says that although she covers some of her basic living expenses by working in people’s houses, society looks at her with contempt.   "Not having legs is not my greatest pain. It is the degrading looks and words of people, calling me crippled and limping, and hundreds of other things that make my suffering even worse. I have no choice. I tolerate it and cry. Why do they call me like this?"   Shamila says that although before the Taliban came to power she used to receive an annual disability allowance of sixty thousand Afghanis from the Department of Martyrs and Disabled, the Taliban, despite cutting that amount in half, do not pay her disability allowance on time.   "Under the previous government, my annual disability allowance was sixty thousand Afghanis. I could manage with that. But now, the Taliban brothers have reduced it by half, and it is not paid at the time I need it. A year passes and only half of it is given."   It is worth mentioning that after several decades of war in Afghanistan, a large number of people, especially women and children, have become disabled. According to statistics provided by the International Committee of the Red Cross in Afghanistan, more than one million people are living with some form of disability, of which ten percent are war-related disabilities.

Social Media Local Taliban officials in Faryab province report that a child has died following a fire at a fuel shop in Andkhoy district. According to the Taliban's police command in Faryab, the incident occurred on Wednesday morning (May 21) in the Andkhoy district market. The command stated that as a result of the fire, the shop owner was injured and his four-year-old child lost their life. The Taliban attributed the cause of the fire to the shop owner's negligence.

Photo: Jim Huylebroek for The New York Times The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) says that one out of every three children in Afghanistan does not attend school. According to the organization, 60 percent of these children are girls. UNICEF stated that in cooperation with the World Bank in Asia, it supports the creation of educational classes for adolescent girls. The organization emphasized that it helps girls in Afghanistan who have been deprived of their right to attend school to continue their education through "community-based classes." This data is being published at a time when, since the Taliban's return to power in Afghanistan, women and girls have been banned from receiving education. The group has also recently shut down a number of local educational classes in several provinces.

Photo: AFP The Taliban have flogged twelve individuals, including three women, in the provinces of Kabul, Kunduz, and Logar. These individuals were punished on charges of "extramarital relations" and "drug trafficking." According to a statement by the Taliban’s Supreme Court, three people in Logar, including one woman, were flogged in public on charges of extramarital relations. The statement notes that two of them received 30 lashes each, and the third received 39 lashes. In Kunduz province, the Taliban court reported that a woman and a man in Qala-e-Zal district were each sentenced to 39 lashes and three years of imprisonment. In Kabul, seven individuals, including one woman, were flogged on various charges. According to the court, one woman and one man received 39 lashes and were sentenced to two years in prison for extramarital relations. Five others were flogged with 20 to 35 lashes and sentenced to prison terms ranging from eight months to three years for buying and selling narcotic tablets and hashish. Human rights organizations and the United Nations have repeatedly condemned the Taliban’s use of corporal punishment and desert trials, calling them serious violations of human rights and contrary to the principles of fair trial. However, the Taliban have continued to ignore these criticisms.

Photo: © 2011 Farzana Wahidy With nearly four years passed since the Taliban’s misogynistic rule in Afghanistan, women and girls have borne the greatest suffering. In addition to depriving women and girls of the right to education, work, and participation in society, the Taliban have arbitrarily arrested many of them from various regions of the country under different accusations and have severely tortured them in their prisons.   Zan TV , in this report, has interviewed two girls who were arrested in the western part of the country on charges of having relationships outside of marriage and not having a male guardian or mahram , and were transferred to Taliban prisons. These girls share horrific and bitter stories of physical torture, suicide, forced marriage, and sexual slavery in Taliban prisons. To protect the identity of the interviewees, we have been compelled to use pseudonyms in this narrative. What happened to Roya during three months in Taliban prison?   Roya, a girl deprived of education, was arrested by the Taliban while returning home from the market along with her sister and cousin, and was imprisoned in the group’s detention center. She describes how she was arrested and the horrifying experience of her imprisonment along with other women prisoners as follows:   “On Tuesday morning, around 8 o’clock, I went to the market with my sister and cousin to buy some things. They also secretly used to go to the gym with me. We walked around a lot and did our shopping. We were in the market until around 11 o’clock. When our shopping was done, we got into a taxi and headed home.   Inside the car, in the front seat, there were two boys. One was tall and thin and the other had wheat-colored skin and average height. They were boys from our own neighborhood. While we were on the way, suddenly four officers from the Taliban’s Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue, wearing white cloaks and black turbans, stopped us. They made everyone get out and then, at gunpoint, beat us and forced us into their own vehicle. When I saw they were taking us in a different direction, I asked what we had done wrong. What is the problem? One of them, who had applied kohl around his eyes, turned to me and said, ‘With this kind of scarf, what Muslim leaves her house?’ I asked again what had happened. The Talib said, ‘Do not speak or I will shoot all of you with one magazine and end everything.’ First they took us to the district station, and there each of the Taliban soldiers looked at us in a different way. They said these ones have definitely committed adultery.   I insisted many times to know why we were being arrested, but it was useless. One of the Taliban said that we were immoral women and that we were leading young men toward sin. That with the kind of clothing we wore, we were attracting men and causing them to fall into sin.   After a few hours, they took us to the detention center. Inside the room, there were about five other girls. The Taliban said, ‘All of you are prostitutes and immoral women.’ They took our phones. The next morning, they took us to the prison. Each of us was taken to a separate room and the door was locked. We had no news of each other. We could only see everything in darkness. It was very hard. I had no news from my family and our family only knew that we had gone to the market. No matter how much I begged and cried to the Taliban to at least give us our phones so we could inform our parents, they said, ‘If you had parents, you would not go out to the market alone.’   No matter how much we screamed and shouted, it was useless. We were crying and the Taliban were laughing. In that house and prison, maybe it was night when a Talib knocked on the door and told me, ‘Hazara girl, it is time for prayer, go and pray, even though you might be an adulterer.’ I lost my temper, I could not tolerate it, I said, ‘Did you bring me here from under a man?’ The Talib said, ‘Just by the way you dress, you lead people toward adultery.’   Inside the prison it was very hard. After two days, I saw my mother had come to the prison gate. Then a Talib took me to a place where I could meet my mother. About ten days passed like that, and then it was my turn for interrogation. I was very scared. A woman was the first to interrogate me. She was wearing casual clothes and spoke in Pashto, but also spoke Persian. She asked me, ‘How many people have you been with? Tell me girl so you can get out of prison quickly.’ I said, ‘I have not been with anyone.’ She said, ‘We received a report.’ I said, ‘I was not with anyone, I had only gone to the market with my sister and cousin for shopping.’   In the end that woman left and then a few more Taliban came. They were registering criminal cases under each girl’s name and sending them to the detention center. They told me, ‘You are an adulterer’ and wrote my case like that.   They forced me to give my fingerprint. No matter how much I resisted, there was no other option because they were beating me. Finally, they took me to prison and when I entered the women's block, I was very shocked. I could hardly breathe. There were many women and young girls in prison from every ethnic group. At first, I threw myself in a corner. I was very tired and also angry. When I asked each woman and girl why they were in prison, they said, ‘We do not know.’ There were girls as young as 14 and women aged 40 or 50 or even older who were imprisoned.   In prison, they treated us very badly. There was a woman who said, ‘You are not allowed to speak with other women and girls in prison.’ Phones were also not allowed. Only the prison staff had phones, and sometimes if we wanted to call our families, they would charge us a lot of money. For every minute of a phone call, we had to pay about two hundred Afghanis.   In the room where I was imprisoned, there were fifteen other girls. Some said they had been arrested for adultery. A number of them had gone mentally unstable and could not speak at all. If we made noise or talked to each other, those female staff members would come and handcuff us. There was a large chain attached to the wall with handcuffs. They would tie our hands with the chain and the handcuffs and would tell the other prisoners, ‘Kick this girl and walk over her.’   I experienced a lot of this cruelty because it was out of my control. After about twenty days, I developed psychological problems. I would cry and scream. That woman came and told two or three other girls, ‘Be quick, tie her hands to the chain.’ The girls, out of fear, tied my hands. Then that female staff member told all the prisoners, ‘Step over this devil girl and kick her so she becomes disciplined again and stops shouting.’   When the prisoners kicked me on my chest, my eyes went dark from the pain. Eventually, I passed out like that. When I regained consciousness, it was very late at night. My hands were all wounded and bleeding. My entire body was in pain. Inside the prison it was very cold because it was winter when we were arrested. There were no blankets or carpets to keep us warm. The floor was bare. A few beds that were there belonged to other girls and women who had been imprisoned before me. They did not give us enough bread to be full, only a few bites just enough so we would not die from hunger.   We all drank water from the toilet tap, and the dishes in which we were given very little food were washed inside the toilet.   Inside the prison, women acted as guards. They would come and tell us, ‘Study, pray so that God may forgive you and you become reformed.’ If someone did not pray, especially the night or morning prayer, they would beat us and hit us with the cables they had.   Women and girls were severely tortured in the prison. When I saw a young girl being tortured under the hands and feet of other women or even male Taliban members, I could not bear it. The cries and sobs and weeping of the girls were more painful and agonizing than anything else.   Many of the women and girls who were imprisoned in our block said that their families did not know where they were. Some also said that they were still in limbo. It might have been six or seven months since they had been in prison but their crime was not clear and there was no reason. They were simply left in uncertainty.   One of the imprisoned girls who was in my room said, ‘My family held a funeral prayer for me and announced my death out of shame from society and people, saying that my daughter has died, so that no one would know I am in prison.’   Some girls in prison were like slaves for the Taliban. They were used for sexual purposes. Other women who shared my room said that here the Taliban forcibly marry the girls. They told stories of other girls who had been in prison before me and were married off to the Taliban.   But for me it was very difficult. At night I would get hungry. There was no bread. Even if we asked for bread or water, they would not give it to us. I spent three months with extreme misery and torture. I had no news of my cousin or my sister, where they were or what they were doing. I was in the second block of the women’s prison.   Every moment I wanted to commit suicide, but then I would say it is a sin and I will not do it for the sake of my father and mother. When my prison term ended, the Taliban came and told me, ‘You come to the prison administration.’ They took me and said, ‘Your imprisonment is over, but your crime is not yet over.’ The head of the prison said, ‘You are lucky that you found a part and your prison time ended quickly, but you must reform and never repeat these bad actions.’   After they took my fingerprint, they brought me in front of my parents and the other imprisoned girls and men. They tied my hands and whipped me. They gave more than forty lashes. My whole back was burning. They hit my thighs and back. After they finished beating me, they told me that I would remain in prison for one more week and would be released after that week.   Believe me, in the Taliban’s prison and detention center, they have made the environment very suffocating for girls. They forced the girls to give in to the Taliban’s desires, but there were girls who did not give in to this group’s demands and committed suicide. In the last days of my imprisonment, one of my roommates went out early in the morning and was missing until noon. She never came back. Suddenly there was a lot of noise and the Taliban rushed into our block. We also came out of our room into the block. The Taliban forced us back into the room and locked the door. Later we heard that our roommate had electrocuted herself and committed suicide. She was a very beautiful and kind girl.   Finally, after one more week, I was released. When I was being released, they brought a paper and told me, ‘Give your fingerprint.’ I said I must read it. One Talib said, ‘You do not have permission to read. You are a sinner. Just give your fingerprint quickly and disappear.’ They forced me to give my fingerprint and sign the paper, and I was released.” Photo: AFP via Getty Images Mysterious Killings of Girls by the Taliban Roya is not the only one who has experienced prison. There are many women and girls who have been subjected to torture, rape, and even murder.   Nabila is another imprisoned girl who has a similar story to Roya. She says she was arrested and imprisoned by the Taliban for going to the gym. She spent four months in Taliban prison and has even more painful stories not only about her own situation but also about other imprisoned girls.   Nabila recounts the fate and silent cries of Sharifa, a girl who was mysteriously killed, as follows: “Maybe two months had passed since I was imprisoned when the Taliban brought a girl of medium height with brown eyes into our cell. A few days passed and I became close to her and we secretly talked together so that the prison staff would not see us. At night when everyone was asleep, we stayed beside each other and talked. She explained the reason for her imprisonment like this:   ‘One of the Taliban had forcibly proposed to me through my family. That Talib was around fifty years old. My father and mother said, “We will not give our daughter; our daughter is too young.” But the Talib ignored what my parents said. He came to our house again. In the end, he said, “I will take your daughter by force and you cannot stop me.” My parents, to protect their honor, gave me away so that people would not say the daughter of so and so was taken by force or ran away, the daughter of this family.   I spent three months with him. He always beat me. He had another wife. She was even more unfortunate than me. She was very weak and thin because of all the suffering. Sometimes he tried to strangle me and then forced himself on me for his sexual needs. He always raped me, with violence and beatings. After one night, I gathered my courage and ran away from the house. I took refuge in my uncle’s home. But for the crime of running away from home, they brought me here and imprisoned me.’   Sharifa had become my only companion in those days. But around 2 o’clock at night, someone knocked on the door of our room. Someone called out, “Who is Sharifa? You must come out right now.” Sharifa went out and never returned. Later, when I was released from prison, I heard that the Taliban had taken her that night and killed her somewhere and thrown her body under a bridge.”   Nabila, overwhelmed with tears, says with sorrow and pain:   “Not only was Sharifa mysteriously murdered, but all the girls of Afghanistan are in such a situation. It is possible that tomorrow thousands of other Sharifas will be forcibly married by the Taliban, and if they resist, they will be killed.”

Photo: 8am.media The Taliban's Department for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice in Uruzgan province has reported the release of a woman who had been imprisoned in her home by her husband for four years. According to the department’s statement, the woman was freed after enduring four years of house arrest and severe torture by her husband. The Taliban stated that the woman's husband, named Sardar Mohammad and a resident of Dehrawud district in Uruzgan, had kept his wife imprisoned at home and subjected her to ongoing abuse and torture. According to the Taliban, the man is also accused of killing their three children. The head of the Taliban’s Department for the Propagation of Virtue in Uruzgan said that two of the woman’s children died during her pregnancies as a result of the intense torture, and the third child lost their life due to neglect and lack of care. Sources confirmed that Sardar Mohammad, aged 45, has been arrested by the Taliban and sentenced to seven years in prison by the group’s court. This comes amid growing reports in recent years of increased violence against women across various provinces in Afghanistan. A significant portion of this violence occurs within families and has in many cases led to imprisonment, torture, and even the death of women and girls.

Photo: Ebrahim Noroozi/AP Photo The International Organization for Migration (IOM) says that thousands of Afghan citizens have been forced to leave Pakistan, and the majority of the vulnerable individuals among the returnees are women and children. In a message published on the social media platform X, the organization stated that its teams are present at border points, providing returnees with services such as food assistance, cash aid, health care, psychosocial support, and protection services. IOM emphasized that half of the Afghans returning to the country rely on humanitarian aid. The organization also announced last week that over the past month, 127,000 Afghan citizens have returned from Pakistan.

Photo: RTA As a result of two separate traffic incidents in Logar province, two women and a child lost their lives, and twelve others were injured. According to the Taliban, one of the incidents took place in the Kotal-e-Tirah area on the Logar-Paktia highway, resulting in the deaths of two women and a child, while eight others were injured. In another incident that occurred in the Mohammad Agha district of this province, four more people were injured. It is worth mentioning that hundreds of citizens lose their lives every year in Afghanistan due to traffic accidents. Driver negligence, poor road conditions, and the lack of traffic signs are considered the main causes of these incidents.

Photo: Anadolu Agency via Getty Images Andrew Saberton, the Executive Deputy Director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), stated following his recent visit to Afghanistan that the suspension of US financial aid has worsened the humanitarian crisis in the country. During a press conference yesterday, Saberton emphasized that the $100 million aid from the United States to this organization was halted simultaneously with the expulsion of Afghan refugees from Pakistan. According to him, this move will deprive 6.3 million people, mostly women, of life-saving care provided by the United Nations Population Fund. He warned that refugees returning from neighboring countries might face serious threats inside Afghanistan. The Executive Deputy Director of UNFPA also added that the deprivation of education for girls has paved the way for an increase in forced and early marriages. Saberton specified that the main victims of these aid cuts are women and girls who need health and medical services. Previously, Tom Fletcher, the UN Deputy Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and the Head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), had also visited Afghanistan and warned about the humanitarian crisis and the devastating impact of the aid cuts.