From US to Kabul, 9/11 scars remain

THE 23rd anniversary of 9/11 — the unexpected and audacious attacks by a non-state entity, Al-Qaeda, that brought down the Twin Towers in New York — was observed in the US last week. In a rare but welcome gesture, bitter political discord was set aside — US President Joe Biden, his predecessor and one-time Republican adversary Donald Trump and Democratic candidate and Vice-President Kamala Harris stood together to pay homage to the victims.

The run-up to the 9/11 anniversary saw the global media engrossed with the high-octane Harris-Trump presidential debate. Predictably, 9/11 and its aftermath were used by the two opponents to score points but there was no substantive deliberation on this subject despite its seminal relevance to the US image and credibility on the global stage.

The US embarked on the global war on terror (GWOT) in October 2001 against the Taliban in Afghanistan for providing shelter to Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. The Pentagon waged this war for 20 years but was unable to realise its objective and finally made an inglorious and shambolic exit in August 2021. The Taliban, who were forced to flee Kabul in the early stages of the war, outwitted and outwaited the formidable US military onslaught and came back to power in mid-August 2021.

This withdrawal was ordered by US President Joe Biden soon after he assumed office in January 2021 — and the war in Afghanistan has been a contentious issue in the American public discourse. While Democrats criticised Republican President Donald Trump for hastily signing the Doha accord in February 2020, the GWOT imposed a huge cost on the US (almost $2 trillion) and was unsustainable militarily and politically. Experts say that the withdrawal could have been managed better. While this is a debatable issue, the net result has been a major setback for the US and the global community that had initially supported the war on terror.

The US had expended vast amounts of resources — both human and fiscal — to defeat jihadi terrorism and its sponsors in Afghanistan and concurrently sought to introduce a form of liberal democracy and respect for women’s rights in Afghanistan. The latter strand was not included in the text of the Doha agreement but was highlighted by US officials during the deliberations and assurances were sought from the Taliban in the matter.

When the Taliban swept to power in Afghanistan in the mid-1990s, they imposed a harsh and inflexible sharia code of conduct for women. This was at sharp variance from the gender equity that women in Afghanistan had enjoyed for decades in the 20th century. At the time, the joke was that the Taliban did not allow women to wear even socks, for that was deemed to be ‘sexy’.

When the Taliban came back to power in August 2021, the many provisions for women, including education and a modest dress code, were all rewritten to go back to the pre-9/11 template and the penalties for non-compliance became even more harsh and callous. The international community chose not to confront the Taliban on this issue. Women’s rights were deemed to be an internal matter and the interpretation of the sharia was left to individual nations.

It is both ironic and tragic that in the run-up to the 23rd anniversary of 9/11, the Taliban in Kabul issued a 100-page document in late August that imposed a draconian code of conduct for women and girls. This morality law was issued by the Afghan Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice; while there are some restrictions for men also, the main focus is on confining women.

They cannot leave their homes unescorted by a male guardian — and now cannot be heard either — whether at home or outside. Basically, women are to remain ‘invisible’ with their entire body covered and their voices are not to be audible. Afghan women who have dared to protest have been rounded up; many have been sent to prison and subjected to physical punishment and in some cases, sexual abuse.

On social media and in the Afghan diaspora, some brave women have protested that this is a case of dying daily even while being alive — but to little avail. The UN has described this treatment of women by the Taliban as ‘gender apartheid’ but none of the major powers in the UN Security Council have made this a consensual policy issue to be taken up with Kabul.

China, it may be recalled, was the first nation to accept a Taliban ambassador in January 2024. In August, the UAE followed suit. This is a political victory for the Taliban, given that the UAE was part of the GWOT and had supported the US effort till the very end.

The deep cynicism and indifference to women’s rights the world over is magnified in a stark manner in Afghanistan. The women of that hapless nation have been abandoned by the global political leadership, and the more conservative faction within the Taliban has emerged triumphant in its harsh anti-women strictures.

Whether the next US President will review this matter in 2025 in a resolute manner is a moot point, dependent on a complex set of domestic issues that animate policy decisions in the Beltway. Given its own bitter experience with the Taliban over the past 25 years, India has been relatively muted, like many of the major powers.

Blood-soaked anniversaries punctuate history regularly. If the global community is unable to compel Israel to cease its genocidal war against Palestine (the first anniversary is on October 7), it is very unlikely that the plight of the women in Afghanistan will register on the global consciousness despite the enormity of 9/11. This is a bleak observation and perhaps hope — however slender — may lie with empathetic global NGOs and their intrepid representatives on the ground who are willing to take the kind of risks that governments are averse to taking. In the interim, the bravery of those Afghan women who are resisting this Taliban-imposed ‘gender apartheid’ and keeping the flame of defiance flickering must be applauded and supported.