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'अफगानिस्तान में अशांति मंजूर है, पर तालिबान शासन बिल्कुल नहीं'
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Published : Apr 29, 2019, 4:38 PM IST
अफगानिस्तान में एक बार फिर से तालिबान की धमक सुनाई देने लगी है. जैसे-जैसे यह खबर सच्चाई की ओर बढ़ रही है, महिलाएं परेशान हो रही हैं. वे चाहती हैं कि अफगानिस्तान में अशांति रहे. उनके लिए शांति से बड़ी चीज इज्जत-आबरू है. उस पर हमला न हो, जैसा तालिबान करते आए हैं.
शांति वार्ता की मांग
काबुल: अफगानिस्तान में तालिबान शासन के लौटने की आहट सुनते ही महिलाएं परेशान हो उठी हैं. उन्हें फिर से वो मंजर दिखने लगा है, जब तालिबान अपने शासन के दौरान महिलाओं पर जुल्म ढहाया करता था. उन्हें घरों की चाहरदीवारी में सिमट कर जिंदगी जीने को मजबूर किया जाता था. अगर किसी ने विरोध करने की हिमाकत की तो सरेआम उनकी पिटाई की जाती थी. अब महिलाएं चाहती हैं कि यहां पर उनका शासन दोबारा ना लौटे.
खडेजा नाम की एक महिला अपने प्रति भयानक व्यवहार को याद करते हुए कहती है कि वह दर्द इतना असहनीय था कि वह भगवान से मरने के लिए प्रार्थना करती थी. उसके पति ने पॉट से उसके चेहरे पर हमला किया था. वह प्रार्थना करती थी कि उसकी मृत्यु हो जाए.
खडेजा के ठीक होने के बाद उन्होंने एक आश्रय स्थल बनाया, जहां वह कक्षाएं लेती हैं और हमेशा सबसे पहले अपना हाथ बढ़ाती है.लगातार दर्द में रहने के बावजूद, वह कहती है कि वह एक दिन शिक्षक बनने की उम्मीद करती है.
अफगानिस्तान में महिलाओं ने एक मांग की है. इसके तहत देश की महिलाएं सरकार पर दबाव बना रही हैं कि अमेरिका और तालिबान के बीच होने वाली शांति वार्ता में उन्हें भी शामिल किया जाए. अगर ऐसा नहीं किया गया तो बाद में उनकी आजादी और अधिकारों को दबाया जा सकता है.
अफगानिस्तान कई वर्षों से युद्ध की मार झेल रहा है. महिला सांसदों का कहना है कि उन्हें अपनी आजादी और आबरू की कीमत पर शांति नहीं चाहिए. इसलिए वे खौफजदा हैं, क्योंकि तालिबान के शासनकाल में कई महिला सांसदों ने उनका जुल्म सहा है. लिहाजा वे दोबारा उस दौर को नहीं जीना चाहती हैं. हालांकि अफगानिस्तान में सत्ता में आने को व्याकुल तालिबान फिलहाल महिलाओं पर पूर्व में लगाए प्रतिबंधों में ढील देने पर राजी हो गया है.
तालिबान दुनिया का सबसे क्रूरतम शासन था. 90 के दशक में तालिबान का उदय हुआ था. उस वक्त लोगों को देश में शांति स्थापित की उम्मीद थी. तालिबान अपने शासन के दौरान महिलाओं के दमन के लिए कुख्यात थे. तालिबान के शासन के दौरान महिलाओं को काफी उत्पीड़न का सामना करना पड़ा.
घरेलू हिंसा की शिकार एक महिला ने बताया, 'जब मैंने उसे (मेरे पति) को देखा तो मैं चौंक गयी, क्योंकि मैं केवल छह साल की थी और मेरे लिए अपने माता-पिता और परिवार के साथ रहने का समय था, शादी करने का नहीं. मैं अकेला महसूस कर रही थी, डर गई थी. और मैं बस रो रही थी और रो रही थी.
एक महिला कार्यकर्ता का कहना है कि हमें इंतजार नहीं करना चाहिए, कोई आकर चांदी की थाली में हमारे अधिकारों की पेशकश करे, जैसे 1996 में तालिबान के दौरान हुआ था. इसलिए यही समय है कि हमें अपने अधिकारों के लिए लड़ना चाहिए, हमें अपने अधिकारों के लिए खड़ा होना चाहिए, हम अफगानी महिंलाओं की आवाज सुनने के लिए अंतर्राष्ट्रीय समुदाय को आगे बढ़ना चाहिए. हम पीछे नहीं हटेंगे.
काबुल: अफगानिस्तान में तालिबान शासन के लौटने की आहट सुनते ही महिलाएं परेशान हो उठी हैं. उन्हें फिर से वो मंजर दिखने लगा है, जब तालिबान अपने शासन के दौरान महिलाओं पर जुल्म ढहाया करता था. उन्हें घरों की चाहरदीवारी में सिमट कर जिंदगी जीने को मजबूर किया जाता था. अगर किसी ने विरोध करने की हिमाकत की तो सरेआम उनकी पिटाई की जाती थी. अब महिलाएं चाहती हैं कि यहां पर उनका शासन दोबारा ना लौटे.
खडेजा नाम की एक महिला अपने प्रति भयानक व्यवहार को याद करते हुए कहती है कि वह दर्द इतना असहनीय था कि वह भगवान से मरने के लिए प्रार्थना करती थी. उसके पति ने पॉट से उसके चेहरे पर हमला किया था. वह प्रार्थना करती थी कि उसकी मृत्यु हो जाए.
खडेजा के ठीक होने के बाद उन्होंने एक आश्रय स्थल बनाया, जहां वह कक्षाएं लेती हैं और हमेशा सबसे पहले अपना हाथ बढ़ाती है.लगातार दर्द में रहने के बावजूद, वह कहती है कि वह एक दिन शिक्षक बनने की उम्मीद करती है.
अफगानिस्तान में महिलाओं ने एक मांग की है. इसके तहत देश की महिलाएं सरकार पर दबाव बना रही हैं कि अमेरिका और तालिबान के बीच होने वाली शांति वार्ता में उन्हें भी शामिल किया जाए. अगर ऐसा नहीं किया गया तो बाद में उनकी आजादी और अधिकारों को दबाया जा सकता है.
अफगानिस्तान कई वर्षों से युद्ध की मार झेल रहा है. महिला सांसदों का कहना है कि उन्हें अपनी आजादी और आबरू की कीमत पर शांति नहीं चाहिए. इसलिए वे खौफजदा हैं, क्योंकि तालिबान के शासनकाल में कई महिला सांसदों ने उनका जुल्म सहा है. लिहाजा वे दोबारा उस दौर को नहीं जीना चाहती हैं. हालांकि अफगानिस्तान में सत्ता में आने को व्याकुल तालिबान फिलहाल महिलाओं पर पूर्व में लगाए प्रतिबंधों में ढील देने पर राजी हो गया है.
तालिबान दुनिया का सबसे क्रूरतम शासन था. 90 के दशक में तालिबान का उदय हुआ था. उस वक्त लोगों को देश में शांति स्थापित की उम्मीद थी. तालिबान अपने शासन के दौरान महिलाओं के दमन के लिए कुख्यात थे. तालिबान के शासन के दौरान महिलाओं को काफी उत्पीड़न का सामना करना पड़ा.
घरेलू हिंसा की शिकार एक महिला ने बताया, 'जब मैंने उसे (मेरे पति) को देखा तो मैं चौंक गयी, क्योंकि मैं केवल छह साल की थी और मेरे लिए अपने माता-पिता और परिवार के साथ रहने का समय था, शादी करने का नहीं. मैं अकेला महसूस कर रही थी, डर गई थी. और मैं बस रो रही थी और रो रही थी.
एक महिला कार्यकर्ता का कहना है कि हमें इंतजार नहीं करना चाहिए, कोई आकर चांदी की थाली में हमारे अधिकारों की पेशकश करे, जैसे 1996 में तालिबान के दौरान हुआ था. इसलिए यही समय है कि हमें अपने अधिकारों के लिए लड़ना चाहिए, हमें अपने अधिकारों के लिए खड़ा होना चाहिए, हम अफगानी महिंलाओं की आवाज सुनने के लिए अंतर्राष्ट्रीय समुदाय को आगे बढ़ना चाहिए. हम पीछे नहीं हटेंगे.
RESTRICTION SUMMARY: AP CLIENTS ONLY
SHOTLIST:
++PLEASE NOTE: THE DOMESTIC ABUSE SURVIVORS SPOKE ON CONDITION THAT THEY BE IDENTIFIED ONLY BY FIRST NAME, FEARING REPRISALS BY FAMILY++
ASSOCIATED PRESS - AP CLIENTS ONLY
Herat - 18 February 2019
1. Various of Khadeja (last name not given), a domestic violence survivor, crying
2. Various of Khadeja's burnt hands
3. Khadeja sitting with other domestic violence survivors
4. SOUNDBITE (Dari) Khadeja (last name not given), domestic violence survivor:
"My whole body was in pain, so much pain that every moment I prayed to my God to help me die. I cried, shouted and asked my in-laws to take me to the hospital and once I was taken to the hospital, I was unconscious."
5. Khadeja talking with other survivors
6. Close of Khadeja's hands
7. SOUNDBITE (Dari) Khadeja (last name not given), domestic violence survivor:
"Once my husband attacked me with a knife and stabbed me three times, I went to my father's house and complained. But they didn't understand my problem and told me that I left the house with a white wedding gown and only my dead body could be back there wrapped in the white shroud of the dead."
8. Domestic violence survivor Alissa (last name given) talking with other survivors
9. Various of Alissa
10. SOUNDBITE (Dari) Alissa (last name not given), domestic violence survivor:
"When I saw him (my husband) I was shocked, because I was only six and that's the time for me to be with my parents and family, not to get married. I was feeling lonely, scared and I was just crying and crying."
11. Various of women's rights activist Suraya Pakzad in her office
12. SOUNDBITE (English) Suraya Pakzad, women's rights activist:
"We should not wait, someone come and offer our rights in a silver plate like what has happened back in 1996 during the time of Taliban. So this is the time that we should fight for our rights, we should stand for our rights, we should push the international community to hear voices of Afghan women. We will not go back."
ASSOCIATED PRESS - AP CLIENTS ONLY
Kabul - 26 April 2019
13. Tilt-down from banner reading: (Dari/Pashto/English) "Ceasefire for Peace" to panel of women on stage
14. Wide of meeting, media in attendance
15. Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission Director Sima Samar speaking
16. Female audience
ASSOCIATED PRESS - AP CLIENTS ONLY
Kabul - 14 February 2019
17. SOUNDBITE (English) Sima Samar, Director of Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission:
(Responding to a question regarding the Taliban saying that they would accept that girls go to school and women work and even be judges, but that they would not accept that a woman become the country's leader or Supreme Court chief justice.)
"Well, I think it's undermining equality, so I am not in favour of that kind of approach, because if even in Quran if they said that 'Everybody is born equal, with dignity,' then, why they are making reservations for us?"
ASSOCIATED PRESS - AP CLIENTS ONLY
Kabul - 26 April 2019
18. Various of Afghan women in audience
19. Set up mid shot of policy advisor for Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, Farangies (no last name given)
20. SOUNDBITE (English) Farangies (no last name given), policy advisor for Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission:
"Women will be a part of this process and that more than anything this peace process in Afghanistan has to be inclusive. That means of all people living in Afghanistan, so all voices need to be heard."
ASSOCIATED PRESS - AP CLIENTS ONLY
Herat - 19 February 2019
21. Traffic
22. Various of women walking
23. Various of women in regional hospital
24. Various of doctor checking report of burn survivor
ASSOCIATED PRESS - AP CLIENTS ONLY
Kabul - 14 February 2019
25. SOUNDBITE (English) Sima Samar, Director of Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission:
"The UN agencies, they are everybody is running that we want to do and support women, but there is no unification. So most of the time it's duplication of the programme and it's very superficial and short term. To change the society, to change the mentality of people and women in a country requires a long-term multi-dimension strategy."
ASSOCIATED PRESS - AP CLIENTS ONLY
Herat - 18 February 2019
26. Various of women's rights activist Suraya Pakzad (screen-left) talking with a domestic violence survivor newly arrived in a women's shelter
27. SOUNDBITE (English) Suraya Pakzad, women's rights activist:
"All my children are sacrificed because of my job and I believe it is not only me, all the women activists who are trying to bring changes in the community and helping others are in the same situation, they are going through that kind of situation."
28. Various of women bakery workers in a safe shelter supervised by Pakzad
STORYLINE:
For four hours, Khadeja begged her in-laws to take her to the hospital.
The husband of the young Afghan woman had thrown a pot of scalding water on her face and upper body.
The skin on her face and neck was peeling and the pain was excruciating.
Recounting her terrible ordeal, she says the pain was so unbearable that she prayed to her God "to help me die".
Khadeja eventually received treatment.
But scar tissue on her neck makes breathing difficult and her hands are misshapen.
Khadeja's mother died when she was young.
Her father married a woman who resented her and wanted her out of the house.
They took her out of school after fifth grade, even as she pleaded to stay.
She says her husband beat her, often tying her to a tree as he did it, or cut her with knives.
When she fled, her father sent her back.
"I only want you back home wrapped in the white shroud of the dead," she says he told her.
Her husband was briefly jailed for hurling the boiling water on her, but he was released without charges.
Once home, he threatened to cut off Khadeja's nose.
Again, she fled to her father's house.
Her stepmother told her she was ugly now and no one would pay a price to marry her if she left her husband.
Women in Afghanistan have made gains since the 2001 fall of the Taliban.
But still the country remains almost the worst place in the world to be a woman.
And impunity for violence against women remains pervasive.
That is why women rights activists demand a seat at the table in peace talks between the government and the Taliban.
Pressure is heavy for a deal as the United States seeks to end its military involvement in the country.
And the activists fear the advances they have achieved will be bargained away in the negotiations.
The Taliban were notorious for their repression of women during their rule.
But activists are just as worried about the other side.
Afghanistan's leadership since the Taliban's ouster has been dominated by conservatives, warlords and strongmen.
Their attitudes toward women are often little different from the Taliban.
President Ashraf Ghani refused to put legislation on the Elimination of Violence Against Women to a vote in parliament.
And activists say it's because he feared it would be defeated by the overwhelming conservative majority.
Khadeja eventually made it to a shelter, where she takes classes and is always the first to raise her hand.
Despite remaining in constant pain, she says she hopes to be a teacher one day.
At the shelter, dozens of women and girls struggle with nightmares.
Alissa was married at age 6 to an 18-year-old in an arrangement so her brother could marry her new husband's sister.
In her village, girls as young as seven and eight were often wed.
But even there, six was considered young.
"I was shocked, because I was only six and that's the time for me to be with my parents and family," she says.
Alissa says she contemplated suicide and wanted to leave, but her brother threatened to kill her if she came home.
She lived with her husband for four years until another brother brought her home.
But her mother-in-law demanded her back, saying the family had paid for her.
As an alternative, she wanted Alissa's younger sister, then seven, but the brother prevented it.
Now both Alissa and her sister live at the shelter, run by Suraya Pakzad of the Afghan Women's Network.
Pakzad operates women's shelters in western Afghanistan and provides legal services to the poor.
This has made her a target of religious extremists and men who believe she interferes in their domestic affairs.
Threats became specific.
Letters promising to kill her and her family detailed what the youngest of her six children - her 15-year-old son - was wearing, his route to school, his friends.
She sent him to safety in Germany.
Pakzad had planned to join peace talks meant to be held in Qatar, along with 17 other women from the network.
But attempts were made to severely limit women's participation in the first round of the all-Afghan talks.
Under pressure from Qatar, President Ashraf Ghani reportedly cut down the number of women from 54 to less than 15.
The organisation sponsoring the talks, Qatar's Center for Conflict and Humanitarian Studies, further reduced it to 10.
In the end, the talks were cancelled because the Center also sought to remove government ministers from Ghani's list.
Even before the cancellation, Pakzad and the other women were told they wouldn't be let in.
Activists press for one-third of participants in any talks to be women - though by all rights, they say, it should be half.
But the Qatar talks weren't the first time they met resistance to having a strong voice in the talks.
Ghani appointed only five women as members of a 37-member council created to shepherd negotiations.
Others include ex-mujahedeen, warlords, a politician accused of a war crime and a former US-declared terrorist.
The advances made since 2011 have been important.
Women are now members of parliament, girls have the right to education, women are in the workforce and their rights are enshrined in the constitution.
But the gains are fragile and their implementation has been erratic, and remain largely unseen in rural areas.
International funding for women's projects is drying up, and political will is also uncertain.
Ahead of negotiations, the Taliban said they would accept that girls go to school and women work and even be judges.
But they insisted that a woman cannot become the country's leader or Supreme Court chief justice.
That's not enough, says Sima Samar, a former women's affairs minister, adding: "It's undermining equality."
"If even in the Quran... they said that 'everybody is born equal, with dignity', then why they are making reservations for us?" adds Samar, who was removed from office for challenging warlords in the post-Taliban leadership.
She now chairs the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission.
She believes that change is only possible by implementing a "long-term multi-dimensional strategy", involving all parties in the peace process, and aid agencies.
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