Cats have more freedom than women in Afghanistan, said Hollywood actress Meryl Streep as she appealed to the international community to stop the Taliban’s oppression.
Speaking on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, the actor revealed that animals have more rights now in Afghanistan following the increase in restrictions on women.
In response, a Taliban spokesman said they “have a lot of respect” for women and would “never compare them to cats”.
Streep’s comments come after the Taliban government last month launched a a new set of “rules of conduct”.
Among other things, these laws reveal that women’s voices can no longer be heard in public and they are not allowed to look directly at men who are not related to them by blood or marriage.
The measures add to a series of restrictions the regime has placed on Afghan women and girls since returning to power three years ago.
Women should cover their faces and bodies completely when they leave their homes. Women and girls over the age of 12 are prohibited from going to schools, parks, gymnasiums and sports clubs. There are restrictions on the type of work they are allowed to do.
“Today in Kabul, a female cat has more freedom than a female cat. A cat may go to sit in its stall before feeling the sun on its face, it may chase a squirrel in the park,” said Streep on Monday at the adoption event. to raise awareness of Afghan women’s rights at the UN headquarters in New York.
“A squirrel has more rights than a girl in Afghanistan today because public parks are closed to women and girls by the Taliban.
“A bird may sing in Kabul, but a girl may not be in society. This is unusual. This is the suppression of natural law.
“The way this culture, this society has been developed, is a cautionary tale for the whole world,” said Streep, who called on world leaders to “stop the heat” on Afghan women and girls.
The Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, who attended the same event, said that Afghanistan “will not take its rightful place in the world” without educated women in the workforce.
Responding to Streep’s comments, a Taliban spokesman said “no one can deny women the rights granted to them by Islam”.
“We respect them a lot in their role as mother, sister, wife [an] important part [the] family and community but we never compare them to cats,” Suhail Shaheen, head of the Taliban’s political office, told the BBC.
He added that currently hundreds of thousands of women are working in various government departments and are entrepreneurs.
Western countries, led by the United States and the European Union, have criticized the new laws, but the Taliban have defended the law saying it is in line with Islamic Sharia law.
The Taliban have also said they are trying to change the education system to be more in line with Islamic principles, and have repeatedly promised that women will be returned to schools once those problems are fixed. However, so far there has been no movement.
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