Meeting between the Afghanistan Women's Rights Watch and UN Special Rapporteur Richard Bennett

Afghan Women’s Rights Watch meets with UN Special Rapporteur Richard Bennett in Ankara

The Afghan Women’s Rights Watch (AWRW) met with Richard Bennett, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Afghanistan, in Ankara, the capital of Turkey, calling for increased independent monitoring and documentation of civil rights violations under Taliban rule.

On Sunday, July 8, the head and members of AWRW discussed with Mr. Bennett the systematic violations of women’s rights and various dimensions of the ongoing crisis in Afghanistan.

AWRW expressed grave concern over rising domestic violence, forced marriages, child marriage, harassment, arbitrary detention, and torture of women, human rights defenders, civil activists, and journalists by the Taliban.

They also raised alarm over the recent surge in deportations of Afghan migrants from Iran, Pakistan, and Turkey.

Richard Bennett, in a recent report, had stated that Afghan families, due to economic poverty and in an effort to protect their daughters from being forcibly married to Taliban members, are being forced to marry them off early. He emphasized that women in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan are marginalized and subjected to multiple layers of gender- and ethnicity-based discrimination.