Afghan Women Still Live in Misery

"Right now it is very bad. I don't think in any other country it would be like this that women are victims of domestic violence, forced marriages and child marriage," Afghan Women's Affairs Minister Masooda Jalal, summing up the horrible situation that Afghani women lives today, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) Tuesday, March7 .

She blasted the phenomenon of families marrying off their children to settle disputes, including over murder or debt, and killings of women thought to have brought dishonor to their families.

"Marriages were not registered, allowing a host of abuses including denial of property and inheritance rights," Jalal said.

The minister said a law is being processed to eliminate violence against women. The current law already bans marriage for girls under 16 but this is seldom enforced.

Jalal further added that a protocol has been circulated among ministries committing them to take steps to eliminate child marriage.

Last year, Amnesty International said women are raped, murdered and abused with impunity all over Afghanistan despite the overthrow of the Taliban by the US-led forces that was supposed to have ushered in a new era of women rights.

The report blamed state institutions for their "systematic failure" to protect women from abuse and violence within and outside families.

Maternal Mortality

Tackling Afghanistan's maternal mortality rate, among the highest in the world, is a priority in the country, Jalal noted.

According to official statistics, over1 , 600of every100 , 000Afghan women die while giving birth.

With each having an average of more than six children, a woman's risk of maternal death is one in about10 .

"If they lose their lives, we cannot talk of other rights; so for us it is a priority that the maternal mortality rate should be decreased," Jalal added.

"Each 30 minutes we lose one mother. Eighty-seven percent of these losses have been studied to be preventable due to lack of access to health services and lots of other factors," she said.

Illiteracy

The second priority for the ministry was education, with more than80 percent of women are still illiterate, the minister added.

"For instance 60 percent of the girls within the school age seven to 13 are outside the education system due to lack of access," she said.

The Taliban, which rose to power in 1996 to end a devastating civil war carried out by commanders, stopped girls from going to school and women from working.

The first ever Afghanistan Human Development Report issued last year, prepared by the UN Development Program (UNDP) with government cooperation, said only28 . 7percent of Afghans over 15 could read and write.

When the Taliban was removed from power, the new government adopted a constitution enshrining equal rights for women.

The first ever women's ministry was established and schools and universities were reopened to women, many of whom took jobs. But Jalal says these achievements are not enough.

For example, she says, only one percent of the top jobs in the government were taken by women.

"Going towards equality, which is guaranteed in the constitution of Afghanistan, there is a long way left," Jalal said.

Part and Parcel

A third priority for the government was to encourage women to play a greater role in society as they are part and parcel of the country along with men, she said.

Jalal last week led about 40 women to pray in a mosque, saying she hoped it would encouraged more of them to leave their homes to worship.

She also oversaw the transport ministry's signing of an agreement to reserve 30 percent of seats on public buses for and to change the attitude of bus drivers who regularly fail to stop if there are only women waiting.

Jalal said resistance from men in patriarchal Afghanistan could be expected to the changes her ministry was bringing about with help from groups such as the United Nations.

"The one who will be losing power will not like it," she said.

"But it doesn't matter -- the goal for us is to have half of the citizens of this country getting their equal rights."

http://islamonline.net/English/News/2006-03/07/article05.shtml