http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/11/opinion/salbi-afghanistan-women/index.html?hpt=hp_c2
[CNN]
Why world must react to Taliban execution - CNN.com
By Zainab Salbi, Special to CNN
July 11, 2012 -- Updated 1738 GMT (0138 HKT)
CNN.com
Editor's note: Zainab Salbi is an Iraqi American writer, activist and social
entrepreneur who is founder of Washington-based Women for Women International,
a humanitarian organization aimed at helping women survivors of war
(CNN) -- The execution of Najiba, an Afghan woman in her 20's, shot 13 times in
front of a cheering crowed in Parwan province -- and seen widely online in a
grainy cell phone video -- is a show of confidence by the Taliban.
It's unclear why she was shot, but local officials offer various reasons for
her execution.
She was reportedly executed last month for adultery, a crime that is indeed
punishable in Islam. But for an adultery charge to be proved, Islam requires
four eyewitness accounts that match precisely.
This is nearly impossible in cultures like Najiba's, where sexual acts are
extremely discrete. But that religious requirement is irrelevant in any case to
the Taliban, whose fanatic view of Islam has been nothing but a violation of
the spirit of the religion itself.
Manhunt under way for Taliban who shot woman in public execution amid cheers
After an hour-long trial, Najiba was shot either by her Taliban husband or
someone else. (One version of the story is she had affairs with two Taliban
members.) But this case is less about Najiba and more about the Taliban
demonstrating its power, even as the United States and Afghanistan attempt
negotiations with the Taliban.
You see, women are like the canary in the coal mine: What happens to them is an
indicator of a larger political direction for the society.
The Taliban has consistently used women to demonstrate its power. When it first
took over much of Afghanistan in 1996, it imposed the harshest seclusion and
prosecution of women in modern history. Afghan women suffered under house
imprisonments. They were forbidden education and any form of mobility, to name
only a few of its brutal prohibitions.
Why women face challenges in Afghanistan
Why women face challenges in Afghanistan
Afghan woman executed in public
But when the international community entered Afghanistan in 2001 and started
introducing laws to protect women's rights, albeit in very basic ways, the
Taliban retreated as its political and military power was weakened. In the past
two years, however, and particularly since the international community started
talking about withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Taliban began boldly resuming
its own rules in provinces where they have recently regained control, such as
Parwan province. And this has been reflected in one act of violence toward
women after another.
Through such public acts -- sometimes recorded, as this one was -- the Taliban
is demonstrating its complete disregard of the Afghan government and the
national rule of law.
Women's rights cannot be taken lightly, nor can they be seen as a marginal
issue separate from the political process of a country. The international
community entered Afghanistan with a clear promise to protect women's rights
and invest in creating opportunities for women to stand up on their feet.
Afghan women took advantage of the opportunities that were presented. They ran
for and took political offices, they sent their daughters to school, they took
loans from microcredit entities and started new business, and they worked in
factories all at personal risks.
They are now asking whether the international community is planning to abandon
them as forces prepare to depart Afghanistan in 2014, and they are worried,
very worried indeed.
Educated and uneducated women working in all sectors in the country are asking
the same question: "Is the international community going to sacrifice its
promise to protect us from the rule of the Taliban in order to reach political
settlement with it?"
If it is, then all the efforts of every soldier, every taxpayer, every
humanitarian worker who has worked -- and in some cases, died -- in Afghanistan
will have been in vain.
To abandon the protection of women's rights to seek political agreement with a
force of repression is to risk a return not only to insecurity in Afghanistan,
but I'd dare say to the world.
The Taliban only started its acts of violence with women. We have to remember
that it did not stop there. That violence eventually affected every Afghan man
and child, and it eventually came to America and impacted the world.
Saving Face: The struggle and survival of Afghan women
The taping of Najiba's execution is the Taliban's message that it is confident.
What's going to be the message back to them from the Afghan government and the
international community? Will it be to demonstrate that women's rights and
protections are valued in actions, in addition to the political statements
already made condemning the execution? We all are responsible for the answer to
that question.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Zainab Salbi.
© 2012 Cable News Network. Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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