Amnesty International, ICJ Call For Investigation Into Taliban’s Crimes Against Women

The CSTO defence ministers gathered in Minsk and discussed the challenges, threats, instability, and bilateral cooperation of the organisation on Thursday.

Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Tajikistan are members of the Collective Security Treaty Organisation.

In the last two years, these countries have held several joint military exercises near the borders of Afghanistan to prevent the infiltration of extremists from the country.

The CSTO member states have expressed their concerns about the active presence of terrorist groups on the borders of Afghanistan.

However, the Russian defence minister warned CSTO member states at the meeting in Minsk that in the future, it is possible for illegal armed groups in Afghanistan to infiltrate neighbouring countries to carry out terrorist acts.

According to Russian media outlets, Shoigu accused the US of planning to use militias in Afghanistan to destabilise the region. He claimed that for this purpose, the transfer of militants from controlled gangs in the Middle East to Afghanistan has been organised.

Shoigu stressed that given the current situation in Afghanistan, it is important to conduct joint exercises bilaterally and multilaterally.

The foreign minister of Iran added that the issue of water rights from the Helmand River can’t be solved with a political statement.

Amir Abdollahian’s statement about the Taliban and Iran’s objection to the group is the latest in a series of tense stances of Iranian officials in recent days.

Earlier during his visit to Indonesia, Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi talked about the situation of Afghan women too.

Tensions of have increased between Iran and the Taliban in the past week after the Iranian president warned the Taliban on the water rights issue from Helmand River.

However, Saleh has not confirmed if there had been any casualties due to the airport attack.

The Afghan Vice-President wrote on Twitter on Thursday that following the attack, the Taliban searched through the smartphones of several people and deleted the images and videos regarding the attack to prevent the information from getting leaked to the public.

Saleh added that following the incident, the Taliban had claimed that such an attack had not taken place.

Saleh, on Monday, attributed the crash of the Taliban’s helicopter in Samangan province to the “Special Unit” too.

However, it is not clear whether the "Special Unit" is part of the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan or acts as an independent group.

At a press conference in Geneva, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights strongly criticised the Taliban and said that he could not understand how the group “can trample so cruelly upon the spirit of girls and women”.

The Taliban has rejected what the United Nations Human Rights Commissioner described as discrimination and oppression of Afghan women and called these statements as interference in the domestic affairs of Afghanistan.

Mawlawi Neda Mohmmad Nadim, the Taliban’s Minister of Higher Education, said in a meeting with the chief of the Pakistani mission in Kabul that international organisations and countries have been interfering in Afghanistan's internal affairs in the name of concerns about human rights situation of Afghanistan.

Justifying the Taliban's discriminatory policies, he said that "Afghans live in a traditional and intellectual society" and portrayed that the Taliban’s policies preserve Afghanistan’s people’s beliefs and culture.

However, Turk pointed out that policies that oppress women must end in Afghanistan and the region. He stressed that such policies while having human effects impacts, also hinder the economic growth of countries.

These protesters chanted the slogan "Women can’t be removed”.

It is the first time, since a long time, that the women have held a demonstration in the northern Takhar province.

No further details have been provided regarding the demonstration.