Structural Violence Against Women in Afghanistan;; Report by: Shabano Noori

Structural Violence Against Women in Afghanistan;; Report by: Shabano Noori

For years, women in Afghanistan have been the victims of both visible and hidden violence perpetrated by extremist groups. Under the rule of the Taliban, women whose only wish is to live normally, enjoy safety, and breathe as human beings have been whipped, threatened, insulted, and even killed. This violence is not a series of isolated incidents; it is a deeply entrenched and systematic structure that defines women not as equal human beings, but as silent and inferior subjects. The muted voices now buried beneath the ground are not individual tragedies — they are part of a collective catastrophe that continues to unfold.

Recent years have shown that women in Afghanistan face the most severe forms of both psychological and physical violence. Harsh restrictions, beatings, flogging, arbitrary detentions, and even group assaults have become a painful reality of their daily lives. Driven by misogynistic and narrow-minded ideology, the Taliban have deprived women of their right to education, work, and social participation. Girls who once walked to school with excitement and hope now stand behind locked doors of schools and universities, deprived of a future, while their minds and spirits deteriorate under the weight of humiliation, fear, and anxiety.

Today, Afghanistan is not a safe home for women — it is a place suspended between life and death. Women may breathe there, but the right to “live” has been taken away from them. Cities are filled with women who appear to be standing, yet in reality, they are like living ghosts — their dreams buried alive under the weight of discrimination, violence, and misogynistic laws. Until the international community, human rights institutions, and the people of Afghanistan unite to dismantle this anti-woman system, the wounds of Afghan women will remain open, and the future of the country will sink deeper into darkness.

End gender apartheid in Afghanistan.

No to violence against women.

Report by: Shabano Noori