The Taliban have suspended the operation of Afghanistanʼs only womenʼs radio station after raiding its premises.
This is reported by CNN.
Radio Begum, a Kabul radio station run by women and focused on womenʼs education, reported that members of the Talibanʼs Ministry of Information and Culture detained the stationʼs staff during a search of its premises.
Officers seized computers, hard drives, files, and phones from employees, including journalists, and took two non-executive employees of the organization into custody.
The ministry later confirmed the suspension of the radio stationʼs broadcasts, citing violations of "broadcasting policy and improper use of the license", including "unauthorized provision of content and programs to a foreign TV channel".
Before the ban, Radio Begum broadcast six hours of lessons a day, as well as programs on health, psychology, and spirituality for women across much of Afghanistan. The station said it provided education to Afghan girls and support for Afghan women, without being "involved in any political activity".
Its sister channels also offer online lessons filmed in studios in Paris. These lessons cover a wider range of subjects, providing education in a country where girls are banned from attending school beyond the sixth grade.
How the Taliban oppresses women in Afghanistan
After seizing power in August 2021, the Taliban began to gradually suppress womenʼs rights. The Taliban banned women from studying in universities and high schools, ordered private universities not to allow them to take entrance exams, and banned women from working in NGOs, playing sports, visiting amusement parks, and driving without a hijab.
The country also closed beauty salons for women, banned women from visiting Band-e-Amir National Park, and sent women who had been subjected to violence to prison. Later, the Taliban banned women from speaking in public, and later from communicating with each other. In addition, Afghanistan banned the installation of windows in houses that would overlook places where women often go — the yard, kitchen, well, etc.
In March 2024, Taliban supreme leader Mawlawi Hibatullah Akhundzada vowed to begin publicly stoning women to death as a sign of their fight against Western democracy.
The Taliban justify all these oppressions with their own interpretation of Islam. The UN believes that the Taliban has introduced the most repressive regime for women in the world. For this, the Taliban may appear before the UN International Court of Justice.
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