The United States Commission for International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) published a report in which it analyzes the situation of religious freedom of women and minorities in Afghanistan, four years after the taking of power by the Taliban.
“The conditions of religious freedom in Afghanistan continue to deteriorate drastically under the Taliban regime,” said the USCirf in a report on August 15, which examines the law on the propagation of virtue and prevention of vice, promulgated a year ago.
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The text adds that “the new moral law reinforces the systematic and open elimination of religious freedom in Afghanistan and facilitates the continuous repression of religious minorities.”
According to the USCIRF, the moral law “affects all Afghans”, but “disproportionately impacts religious minorities and women, eliminating their participation in public life and systematically suppressing their right to freedom of religious beliefs.”
The law, approved in August 2024, contains 35 articles focused on imposing the Taliban interpretation of Islam and Sharía. According to the report, it gives the authorities “broad powers to arrest, stop and monitor Afghans that they are perceived as offenders of their provisions.”
Among the 35 articles, there is the criminalization of adhesion to any religion other than Sunni Islam. According to the USCirf: “Non -Muslims are forced to practice in secret or risk being arrested and tortured.”
The report quotes the Minister Taliban of propagation of virtue and prevention of vice, Khalid Hanafi, who declared that Hindus, Jews, Christians and Sijs are “worse than four -legged animals” for sustaining “beliefs contrary to Sharía and the Koran.”
All Afghan women – Muslim or not – are bound by the moral law to completely cover their body and face. They are also prohibited from leaving their homes without the company of a male tutor. The norm “characterizes the voice of women as intimate and, therefore, something that must be hidden.” Consequently, they are prohibited from speaking, singing or reciting the Qur’an in public.
“While moral law affects all Afghan, disproportionately impacts Afghan women and girls. Until 2025, Afghan women and girls still cannot attend school after 12 years. The educational prohibition, together with the moral law, makes it impossible to participate in public life, including religious expression,” the report said.
“The demand for a male tutor, reinforced under moral law, has created important barriers for Afghan women,” the report continued, highlighting that widows without male relatives are especially affected.
The Ministry of Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, restored shortly after taking power by the Taliban in 2021, supervises the application of moral law.
According to the USCIRF, there are approximately 3,330 male agents deployed in 28 of the 34 provinces of the country.
The Commission denounced that intensified surveillance, arrests and arbitrary arrests, forced conversions, physical aggressions, death threats and torture are tactics used by agents throughout Afghanistan. Citing a UN report, he indicated that up to 50 Ismaili Muslims were forced to become Islam Suni and that an Ismaili man was killed in the province of Badakhshan.
“The man was severely tortured before his death,” said the USCIRF, also adding that “while they were in Custody Taliban, the ethnic or religious identity of individuals influenced the severity of the torture inflicted, even in the case of Christians and Hazas.”
Translated and adapted by ACI Press. Originally published in CNA.
Low Elhabbal
Madalaine Elhabbal is a CNA journalist based in the Washington DC office in EWTN. He has published articles in Catholicvote and has also worked as a foreign language assistant in France. She is a graduate of Benedictine College.