Afghan Taliban order women’s beauty parlours to shut down

Kabul, Afghanistan (AFP):

Afghanistan’s Taliban authorities have ordered beauty parlours across the country to shut within a month.

After seizing power in August 2021, the Taliban government committed to protect the rights and liberties of women, unlike their earlier stint in power. However, the restrictions have grown incrementally, and the latest one happens to be the closure of beauty parlours serving women.

The Taliban adhere to an ultra conservative brand of Islam, which is rejected by an overwhelming majority of Muslims. Several eminent Islamic scholars hailing from different sects and schools of thought have opposed Taliban’s restrictions on women and said such restrictions have nothing to do with the clear and basic teachings of Islam.

Women have also mostly been barred from working for the United Nations or NGOs, and thousands have been sacked from government jobs or are being paid to stay at home.

Mohammad Sadeq Akif Muhajir, spokesman for the Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, has not so far explained why the new order had been given.

“Once they are closed then we will share the reason with the media,” he said dismissively.

He said the businesses had been given time to close their affairs so they could use up their stock without incurring losses.

A copy of the order said it was “based on verbal instruction from the supreme leader”.

Beauty parlours mushroomed across Kabul and other Afghan cities in the 20 years that US-led forces occupied the country.

They were seen as a safe place to gather and socialize away from men and provided business opportunities for women.

A report to the UN’s Human Rights Council last week by Richard Bennett, the special rapporteur for Afghanistan, said the plight of women and girls in Afghanistan “was among the worst in the world”.

UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights Nada Al-Nashif said: “Over the past 22 months, every aspect of women’s and girls’ lives has been restricted.

“They are discriminated against in every way.”

Supreme Leader Hibatullah Akhundzada said last month women in Afghanistan were being saved from “traditional oppressions” by the adoption of Islamic governance and their status as “free and dignified human beings” restored.

Akhundzada, who rarely appears in public and rules by decree from the Taliban’s birthplace in Kandahar, said in a statement marking the Eid al-Adha holiday that steps had been taken to provide women with a “comfortable and prosperous life according to the Islamic Shariah.”