An open letter
To: Whom it may concern, especially all International communities
From: A group of 13Afghan women of former Ministry of Women Affairs (9 Provincial, 4 National Directors and Advisor)
Subject: Seeking for safe evacuation from Afghanistan for rescue their life in a safe place.
Date: 13 November 2021
Dear respectful Sir and Madam,
As all the world know and aware that Afghanistan fighting within the past four decades, badly affected on the life of the people, especially the women are the first victims of fighting, violence, injustice and killings of extremist and radical groups. The Taliban is one of extremist and radical groups since its establishment on 1994 did a lot of actions against human rights specifically against the women rights. Due to the above mentioned issues the Ministry of Women’s Affairs was established on a need base and Bonn decision.
At the first step the Ministry of Women’s Affairs is grateful for all the cooperation of the international communities, since its establishment, on the base of the Bonn Conference decision. The ministry, established to improve the situation of women after Taliban in six fields with encourage of the international communities mainly on health, education, poverty and economics, legal affairs, politics and security, has been an official institution for the past 20 years. The government structure by creating the first ten-year national action plan for women based on the MDG and ANDS; with fundamental changes in the lives of Afghan women in formal structures, reform and enactment of special laws, gender mainstreaming on the national policies and plans in the eight national sectors. In recent years, women have been able to compete with men in the political and social aspects, and have gradually reached a non-discriminatory and non-violence human society, although they still face many challenges.
The Ministry of Women’s Affairs, despite having the lowest budget in the Cabinet of the Government of the Republic of Afghanistan, was able to be the voice of women inside and outside Afghanistan, and in this way suffered many casualties. Unfortunately, we lost 3 provincial women affairs Directors, let us remember them.
The leadership delegation of the Ministry of Women’s Affairs has coordination for many years, supervised and implemented national programs and projects in the national level of the women sector, and tried to bring these activities from the center to the villages and assure women that they are not alone and stood by them with resistance.
Now, with the return of the Taliban, whose first ax is bit to the body of women, which is the destruction and ending the Ministry of Women’s Affairs, with this action all women’s hopes for the future were despaired. For example we say that with ending of the Ministry of Women Affairs, at the first step destroyed the joint house of all women and the next step, they deprived the girls for going to educational centers.
The international communities, despite the removal of the Ministry of Women’s Affairs, which was the first step in the fight against extremism; They are aware that it was indifferent and had no practical support for women to get out of this mire
We, the women and men who fought for humanity, and each of us was the hope of hundreds of thousands of other free-thinking women in this land. Therefore, now we are in a very serious security threat and in a dire situation. On daily base we are under the threats of the released prisoners of perpetrators of violence against women in addition to public threats; we are faced with tens of security problems, for example; each of the provincial director of women affairs has backed tens of cases a month, and all of them are now faced with a separate threat. Each of us, with experience of decades in the field of women’s rights, is now helpless and hoping for the support of the international community. Finally, the Directors, including the central and provincial directors, along with the deputy minister’s adviser, are desperately seeking support to rescue and safe ourselves and our families for a better future and more services to reach a non-violent society.
As we have mentioned in above of the open letter we are a group of 20 high level employees of former ministry of women affairs as a following details:
1. 9 Provincial Directors of women affairs,
2. 4 Central / National Directors, head of departments and advisor,
For your further information the details of each person (name and job title) will share in a separate sheet. The evacuation of this mostly women directors group from Afghanistan is an urgent need and important because our and our family life are in at risks. Therefore, we all call on the international communities to cooperate and help our evacuation from Afghanistan and provide an opportunity for our resettlement in safe place.
With best regards
