Afghanistan: Two years on from the Taliban seizing power, women fight back against poverty and restrictions
Women in Afghanistan have set up secret businesses to escape the brutal restrictions of the Taliban, who swept to power two years ago today.
Since the August 2021 takeover, the group has become entrenched as rulers of Afghanistan and faces no significant opposition that could topple the regime.
The Taliban‘s seizing of power resulted in the end of two decades of increased economic opportunities and freedom for women in the country.
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‘No hope’ for Afghan women
Marzia Babakarkhail, a former family court judge in Afghanistan, told Sky News that women in the country are “in a battle”.
“We have no happiness outside or inside Afghanistan. We have no hope, we have no future for the young generation. There is just darkness and hopelessness,” she said.
The Taliban banned women from doing most jobs, barred girls and young women from secondary school and university education and imposed harsh curtailments on their freedoms.
All the while, the country faces a severe economic crisis, with 85% of the population living under the poverty line.
But some women whose businesses were destroyed have made the transition to smaller, underground enterprises to make ends meet.
Women in Kabul in November 2022
Laila Haidari’s restaurant was a lively hive of activity in Kabul that was known for its music and poetry evenings and was popular with intellectuals, writers, journalists and foreigners.
She reinvested the profits from the restaurant into a drugs rehabilitation centre she set up nearby.
But just a few days after the Taliban seized power, the group destroyed Ms Haidari’s restaurant, looted the furniture, and threw out the patients attending the rehab centre.
Just five months later, she opened a secret craft centre where women can earn a small income stitching dresses and fashioning jewellery from melted-down bullet casings.
“I opened this centre to provide jobs for women who desperately need them,” Ms Haidari said.
“This is not a permanent solution, but at least it will help them put food on their table.”
An Afghan woman walks among Taliban soldiers at a checkpoint in Kabul last month
The centre now helps fund an underground school providing 200 girls with lessons in maths and English. Some attend in person, others online.
“I don’t want Afghan girls to forget their knowledge and then, in a few years, we will have another illiterate generation,” Ms Haidairi said, referring to the women and girls deprived of education during the Taliban’s last period of rule from 1996 to 2001.
The centre, which also makes men’s clothing, rugs and home decor items, employs about 50 women who earn around £47 a month.
“If the Taliban try to stop me I’ll tell them they must pay me and pay these women,” she said.
“Otherwise, how will we eat?”
Dressmaker Wajiha Sekhawat, 25, created outfits for clients based on celebrities’ social media posts before August 2021.
But now her monthly income has fallen from about £470 to less than £150 partly due to demand for party dresses and business outfits plummeting after most women lost their jobs.
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She would travel to Pakistan and Iran to buy fabrics for clients but now cannot travel without a male chaperone – a mahram – and often cannot afford the cost of doing so.
When she sent a male family member to Pakistan in her place he returned with the wrong fabrics.
“I used to make regular business trips abroad by myself, but now I can’t even go out for a coffee,” Ms Sekhawat said.
“It’s suffocating. Some days I just go to my room and scream.”
The restrictions are particularly difficult for the country’s estimated two million widows, as well as single women and divorcees who may not have anyone to act as their male chaperone.
After her husband’s death in 2015, Sadaf relied on the income from her busy Kabul beauty salon to support her five children.
Kabul in November 2022
She offered hairstyling, make-up, manicures and wedding makeovers to a wide range of women from government workers to TV presenters.
Sadaf, 43, who asked to use a pseudonym, began running her business from home after the Taliban told her to shut her salon.
But with clients having lost their own jobs, most stopped coming or cut back and her monthly income dropped dramatically.
Last month the authorities ordered all salons to shut down, saying they offered treatments that went against their Islamic values.
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More than 60,000 women are likely to lose their jobs as a result, according to industry estimates.
While the future looks grim for women’s freedoms in the country, aid agencies said they are emphasising the economic benefits of allowing women to work when negotiating with Taliban authorities.
“We tell them if we create jobs it means that these women can feed their family, it means they are paying taxes,” Melissa Cornet, an adviser to CARE Afghanistan, said.
“We try to have a pragmatic approach and usually it’s quite successful. The Taliban are very keen on the economic argument.”
World
Trump criticises Putin after potentially ‘historic’ meeting with Zelenskyy before Pope’s funeral
Donald Trump has criticised Vladimir Putin and suggested a shift in his stance towards the Russian president after a meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskyy before the Pope’s funeral.
The Ukrainian president said the one-on-one talks could prove to be “historic” after pictures showed him sitting opposite Mr Trump, around two feet apart, in the large marble hall inside St Peter’s Basilica.
The US president said he doubted his Russian counterpart’s willingness to end the war after leaving Rome after the funeral of Pope Francis at the Vatican.
Follow live updates: 200,000 mourn at Vatican
In a post on his Truth Social platform, he said “there was no reason” for the Russian president “to be shooting missiles into civilian areas, cities and towns, over the last few days”.
The two leaders held talks before attending the Pope’s funeral
He added: “It makes me think that maybe he doesn’t want to stop the war, he’s just tapping me along, and has to be dealt with differently, through ‘Banking’ or ‘Secondary Sanctions?’ Too many people are dying!!!”
The meeting between the US and Ukrainian leaders was their first face-to-face encounter since a very public row in the Oval Office in February.
Mr Zelenskyy said he had a good meeting with Mr Trump in which they talked about the defence of the Ukrainian people, a full and unconditional ceasefire, and a durable and lasting peace that would prevent the war restarting.
Other images released by the Ukrainian president’s office show Sir Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron were present for part of the talks, which were described as “positive” by the French presidency.
Mr Zelenskyy‘s spokesman said the meeting lasted for around 15 minutes and he and Mr Trump had agreed to hold further discussions later on Saturday.
The world leaders shared a moment before the service
Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy meet in the Basilica
But the US president left Rome for Washington on Air Force One soon after the funeral without any other talks having taken place.
The Ukrainian president’s office said there was no second meeting in Rome because of the tight schedule of both leaders, although he had separate discussions with Mr Starmer and Mr Macron.
The French president said in a post on X “Ukraine is ready for an unconditional ceasefire” and that a so-called coalition of the willing, led by the UK and France, would continue working to achieve a lasting peace.
There was applause from some of the other world leaders in attendance at the Vatican when Mr Zelenskyy walked out of St Peter’s Basilica after stopping in front of the pontiff’s coffin to pay his respects.
Donald Trump and the Ukrainian president met for the first time since their Oval Office row. Pic: Reuters
Sir Tony Brenton, the former British ambassador to Russia, said the event presents diplomatic opportunities, including the “biggest possible meeting” between Mr Trump and the Ukrainian leader.
He told Sky News it could mark “an important step” in starting the peace process between Russia and Ukraine.
Professor Father Francesco Giordano told Sky News the meeting is being called “Pope Francis’s miracle” by members of the clergy, adding: “There’s so many things that happened today – it was just overwhelming.”
The bilateral meeting comes after Mr Trump’s peace negotiator Steve Witkoff held talks with Mr Putin at the Kremlin.
They discussed “the possibility of resuming direct negotiations between Russia and Ukraine”, Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said.
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Russia and Ukraine have not held direct talks since the early weeks of the war, which began in February 2022.
Mr Trump has claimed a deal to end the war is “very close” and has urged Mr Zelenskyy to “get it done” in a post on his Truth Social platform.
He has previously warned both sides his administration would walk away from its efforts to achieve a peace if the two sides do not agree a deal soon.
Meanwhile, the Polish armed forces said a Russian military helicopter violated its airspace over the Baltic Sea on Friday evening.
“The nature of the incident indicates that Russia is testing the readiness of our air defence systems,” they said in a post on X.
On an extraordinary day, remarkable pictures on the margins that capture what may be a turning point for the world.
In a corner of St Peter’s Basilica before the funeral of Pope Francis, the leaders of America and Ukraine sit facing each other in two solitary chairs.
They look like confessor and sinner except we cannot tell which one is which.
Leaning forward hands together in their laps, Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy stare at each other in one photo.
In another, the Ukrainian president seems to be remonstrating with the US president. This is their first encounter since their infamous bust-up in the Oval Office.
The two leaders held talks before attending the Pope’s funeral
Other pictures show the moment their French and British counterparts introduced the two men. There is a palpable sense of nervousness in the way the leaders engage.
We do not know what the two presidents said in their brief meeting.
But in the mind of the Ukrainian leader will be the knowledge President Trump has this week said America will reward Russia for its unprovoked brutal invasion of his country, under any peace deal.
Mr Trump has presented Ukraine and Russia with a proposal and ultimatum so one-sided it could have been written in the Kremlin.
Kyiv must surrender the land Russia has taken by force, Crimea forever, the rest at least for now. And it must submit to an act of extortion, a proposed deal that would hand over half its mineral wealth effectively to America.
The world leaders shared a moment before the service
Afterwards, Zelenskyy said it had been a good meeting that could turn out to be historic “if we reach results together”.
They had talked, he said, about the defence of Ukraine, a full and unconditional ceasefire and a durable and lasting peace that will prevent a war restarting.
The Trump peace proposal includes only unspecified security guarantees for Ukraine from countries that do not include the US. It rules out any membership of Ukraine.
Ukraine’s allies are watching closely to see if Mr Trump will apply any pressure on Vladimir Putin, let alone punish him for recent bloody attacks on Ukraine.
Or will he simply walk away if the proposal fails, blaming Ukrainian intransigence, however outrageously, before moving onto a rapprochement with Moscow.
If he does, America’s role as guarantor of international security will be seen effectively as over.
This could be the week we see the world order as we have known it since the end of the Second World War buried, as well as a pope.
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