Afghanistan crisis: UN calls for safety of human rights activists after Taliban takeover

After the Taliban swept into Afghanistan's capital Kabul on Sunday, August 15, a UN Special Rapporteur has urged countries to provide urgent assistance to human rights defenders. Karima Bennoune, the UN Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights, also stated that Afghanistan is facing a "cultural disaster," following the fall of Kabul to Taliban forces.

"It is deplorable that the world has abandoned Afghanistan to a fundamentalist group like the Taliban whose catastrophic human rights record, including the practice of gender apartheid, use of cruel punishments and systematic destruction of cultural heritage, when in power, is well documented," she added. She further said that she was immensely concerned at reports of gross abuses by the Taliban, including attacks on minorities, the kidnapping of a woman human rights defender, the killing of an artist, and the exclusion of women from employment and education. 

'Foreign governments have legal and moral obligation to protect the rights of Afghans' 

As soon as the Taliban took control of the capital city, Afghanistan descended into chaos and residents were seen rushing to leave the country, lining up at cash machines to withdraw their life savings. Heavily armed Taliban fighters fanned out across the capital, and several entered Kabul’s abandoned presidential palace as the government led by President Ashraf Ghani had collapsed.

"It is not enough for foreign governments to secure the safety of their own nationals. They have a legal and moral obligation to act to protect the rights of Afghans, including the rights to access to education and to work, without discrimination, as well as the right of everyone to take part in cultural life," said Bennoune, recalling how Taliban's own cultural officials in 2001 had attacked the country's national museum, destroying thousands of the most important pieces.  

'Afghan cultural rights defenders worked tirelessly to create a new culture' 

She further claimed that Afghan cultural rights defenders have worked tirelessly and at great risk since then to reconstruct and protect this heritage, as well as to create a new culture. "Governments which think that they can live with 'Pax Taliban' will find that this is a grave error that destroyed Afghan lives, rights and cultures, and eviscerated important advances that had been made in culture and education in the last two decades with international support and through tireless local efforts," she added.  

The UN Special Rapporteur warned that such a policy will not only harm Afghans but will also weaken the struggle against fundamentalism and extremism, and will have a harmful effect on cultures across the world. It is pertinent to mention here that the Taliban seized nearly all of Afghanistan in just over a week, despite the billions of dollars spent by the US and NATO over nearly 20 years to build up Afghan security forces. 

Image Credits: AP/@UNSRCulture/Twitter