Berlin.
Taliban prohibit women from working in aid organizations. The horror is right, but should not lead to wrong conclusions.
There are decisions that can only be wrong. That Taliban regime in Afghanistan bans women from public life, forcing them under the ideology of Stone Age Islamists. At the same time, millions of people suffer from the consequences of war and poverty. Now the Taliban are banning women from working in aid organizations – of all things, in a profession that the country so urgently needs. Shouldn’t helpers accept that and withdraw? Or help, no matter how inhuman the laws are?
Some organizations have now decided: We will no longer help as long as our employees are allowed to work again. As a result, more people suffer. The personal decision is understandable. Humanitarian aid needs attitude. Especially when helpers work in dictatorships, they have to make enough compromises with values such as freedom and equality in everyday life, such as wearing a headscarf or accepting that only boys are allowed to go to school.
There are limits to what humiliation or deprivation of liberty a person can endure. That goes for the Afghans. But that also applies to the helpers. Everyone is free to draw this red line for themselves. And the Taliban must feel this line. You have to see: Our repression has consequences – ultimately for our own people, too, who the regime has long been unable to keep alive without outside help. For more than a year, the Taliban have had one answer to their helplessness: brutality.
Afghanistan: Tens of thousands of people have been killed in the fighting
The decision to withdraw aid organizations is understandable for these reasons – and yet the decision is politically wrong. Since the Taliban took power, the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan has become even more catastrophic than before. More than half of the 40 million people can no longer feed themselves, almost ten million experience acute hunger.
These people in need need help from the west. And the West has a responsibility. The USA and Germany and others have left the country head over heels after decades of trying to ensure peace with soldiers – and never being able to tame the chaos. Tens of thousands of people have been killed in fighting between the western alliance and Taliban and terrorist groups.
The commandment of humanity knows no political preferences
Helpers risk their lives when they save people in wars. They also help criminals and Islamists. Knows the commandment of humanity no political preference. This principle deserves respect. Now the situation is even more critical: the helpers themselves are the target of a misogynistic policy and are restricted in their work. This is breaking a taboo. But it’s not the first by the Taliban. Women are already banned from many living environments in Afghanistan. Anyone who makes women’s rights the yardstick for their actions should have withdrawn long ago.
At the same time, the Taliban agrees that a withdrawal of humanitarian aid workers brutality Not about. They will not rule leniently from tomorrow. But continue to pursue women. The political pressure of the withdrawal is limited. Organizations need to recognize that.
SPD politician Peter Struck once said that Germany’s security is also being defended in the Hindu Kush. Today it has to be: Germany credibility is defended in the Hindu Kush. Whoever pulls out now loses the last bit of foreign policy credibility.
More articles from this category can be found here: Politics
