RAWA believes that no other nation can liberate Afghan women, and it is their own responsibility to raise and fight for their rights. In this hard fight we need the support and solidarity of peace-loving and democratic-minded people of the world.
— Eman Mansour, a campaigner with the antifundamentalist human rights group, the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA)
by Eman Mansour
Sunday 11 January 2009, The Journal Issue 16
After NATO’s invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, most people thought the world had finally remembered and rescued a country drowned in pain and sorrow. But despite the attention paid by the international community, today Afghanistan is one of the poorest, most under-developed countries in the world. The false slogans of “womens’ freedom” and “democracy” by the US helped it justify its invasion but today the people, especially women, feel betrayed by those false promises.
The US government brought back to power the men who devastated the country and the lives of the people like no government before. These are the criminals of the Northern Alliance who fought among themselves from 1992-96, immersing the country into deep turbulent years of unimaginable crimes: abductions, torture, rape, looting and forced labour. The warlords involved like Abdul Rab Rasool Sayyaf, Burhanuddin Rabbani and others enjoy high posts in the so-called democratic government today – but the people want to see them on trial in courts. In a nutshell, the present government today is ideologically no different from the Taliban.
To throw dust in the eyes of the world, they sent 68 female members to the parliament as a showcase – but in fact the vast majority of them are fundamentalist women who were sent to the parliament by warlords. The Women’s Ministry is another showcase that has done nothing for Afghan women. Malalai Joya, the only MP who dared to draw attention to the plight of Afghan women, was quickly expelled from the parliament.