Support Grows As Hunger Strike By Afghan Activists In Germany Enters Second Week

A hunger strike by a group of Afghan rights activists to protest the anti-female policies of the ruling Taliban has entered its second week as they seek international recognition of the militants' policies as "gender apartheid."

The protest that began on September 1 in the German city of Cologne comes after the Taliban rulers who seized power in the country two years ago banned women from education and from working in most economic sectors. The hard-line Islamist group has also banned women from visiting parks and imposed strict restrictions on their movement and how they can appear in public.

Zarmina Paryani, whose sister Tamana Zaryab Paryani was taken to the hospital on the night of September 9 after her health rapidly deteriorated because of the hunger strike, struck a defiant tone, saying that "until Tamana’s demands are heard, she will not end her strike.”

"She told doctors she could not leave her comrades alone and returned straight to the protest camp from the hospital,” Zarmina Paryani told RFE/RL’s Radio Azadi.

The two sisters and several other Afghan women activists said they launched the strike after hundreds of protests inside Afghanistan and internationally failed to produce any results.

The protest has attracted solidarity and support from rights activists in Europe and Pakistan, they say.

“There is gender apartheid in Afghanistan,” said Ziauddin Yousafzai, the father of Pakistani Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai, who visited the protesters in Cologne on September 11.

“Under the Taliban, there is no notion of a public life for women,” he told RFE/RL’s Radio Mashaal.

In the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, Roqia Saee, an Afghan women’s rights activist, is leading a hunger strike in solidarity with the activists in Cologne.

“We will continue the strike until the United Nations, countries of the region and the world, and those who support human rights pay attention to our demand,” she told Radio Azadi.

Since July, UN experts and senior officials have said the Taliban’s systematic restrictions on women and girls could amount to "gender apartheid."

The Taliban, however, has so far resisted all international and domestic pressure calling for a change in policies toward women.