Thread by @HRW_Brussels

🔴Today, the European Parliament Committee on Foreign Affairs is discussing "#Afghanistan: regional impact after the Taliban takeover."

📢@heatherbarr1 is here to highlight gaps on the international response to the attack on Afghan women’s rights.

🧵...

@heatherbarr1 First, EU Special Envoy for Afghanistan @tomas_niklasson describes the security impact of the Taliban takeover & neighboring countries responses.

“Human rights & inclusivity are in principle issues regional countries advocate for – but intensity & focus on these demands vary.”

"The EU offers support to countries the region to manage migration and displacement, in addition to extended support from EU member states."

💡Alliance for Human Rights in Afghanistan wrote recommendations to protect Afghan refugees rights everywhere: hrw.org/news/2022/06/2…

Next comes Andrew Watkins, (@and_huh_what), from @USIP

“The Taliban claim to restore 'law & order' and not interfering with any neighboring countries. This has been violated repeatedly.”

⚠️highlights the lack of counterterrorism cooperation.

.@TimorSharan, Director of Afghanistan Policy Lab, described the region moving towards more instability.

“Taliban are the source of the problem, not the solution.”

In terms of inclusivity of the government, one of the EU's benchmark, “horrific brutality continued in Panshir province, and the Taliban have done nothing to give people voice & representation. ”

Our report on this: hrw.org/news/2022/06/1…

Associate director for Women’s Rights at @hrw, @heatherbarr1 opens her remarks with the image of the memorial for girls & women killed in an attack against the Kaaj education center, in Dasht-i-Barchi.

⚠️ "There is no peace in Afghanistan for women and girls"

CONTEXT: the severity of the situation in Afghanistan: Prof. @karimabennoune writes that Taliban violations of the rights of women and girls in Afghanistan are so severe that they demand use of the term “gender apartheid”

⤵️
justsecurity.org/82651/the-best…

Political responses should be appropriate to an apartheid state.
Especially since “Taliban leaders are attempting to erase women and girls from public life through systematic gender-based discrimination and violence.” as the @SR_Afghanistan stated in a report earlier this year.

‼️“No other country is systematically denying girls education based on gender and denying women the right to work.” @heatherbarr1

@heatherbarr1 In a report last week, @hrw documented the experiences of women protesters who were detained and disappeared by the Taliban.

The ex-detainees described torture and mistreatment of their families. Read it here: hrw.org/news/2022/10/2…

🔴The situation in Afghanistan right now is the most serious women’s crisis in the world.
🔴It is the most serious women’s rights crisis since the Taliban were last in power from 1996 to 2001.

#afghanistanwomen

"There is no accountability for perpetrators.
There is no reliable press.
There are no more female journalists."

Countries that have committed to feminist foreign policy, such as Germany or the Netherlands should especially support Afghan women and girls.

This is an attack on women’s rights worldwide. Therefore, all of us have a stake in this unfolding crisis.

There are tools that can be used to concretely promote women’s rights in Afghanistan.
1⃣Ensure a fully-staffed and fully-resourced UN mandated accountability mechanism.
2⃣The Security Council should add additional Taliban leaders to the targeted sanctions lists...⤵️

3⃣ Afghanistan needs a functioning economy. Winter already started. People will starve again. The central bank should be able to function *with oversight*.
4⃣Donors should work with 🇦🇫experts to make education alternatives available to every girl who's been forced out of school.

.@heatherbarr1 reminds that @hrw advocate vigerously to make the Afghan economy function again. There’s a lot of caution around sanctions, and rightly so - we call to focus sanctions on several leaders (ie travel bans), not on all people.

A Q&A on this:
hrw.org/news/2022/08/0…

On the situation of refugees outside Afghanistan:
Huge nbs of people stranded in 🇮🇷 & 🇵🇰. Some of them are threatened for their lives (activists, LGBTI people in countries criminalizing them). It's a desperate situation.

‼️ It is important to also think about resettlement.

⚠️📺In case you've missed @heatherbarr1's remarks at the European Parliament on #Afghanistan's rights crisis yesterday: the recording of the event is available here⤵️
multimedia.europarl.europa.eu/en/webstreamin…, from 10:30.