Taliban issue order to end all protests after days of demonstrations

The interior ministry of the new Taliban government is seeking to end protests in Afghanistan after days of demonstrations that have brought heavy-handed assaults on protesters.

The minister has issued an order to end all protests in the country — unless demonstrators get prior permission, including approval of slogans and banners.

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It’s unlikely the women who have been leading near daily protest demanding their rights from the country’s extremist rulers will be allowed to protest under the new rules.

In the words of the ministry’s statement: “It is announced to all citizens not to attempt at the present time to hold any demonstrations under any name whatsoever.”

Women hold placards as they protest in Kabul, Afghanistan, on September 3, 2021 in this still image obtained from a social media video. (Reuters)

Three weeks after storming to power, the Taliban announced an all-male interim government on Tuesday that included the Ministry of Guidance and Call, formerly known as the Ministry of Promotion of Virtue and Punishment of Vice or the moral police.

During the Taliban’s prior 1996-2001 rule, girls could not attend school and women were banned from working or studying.

Women had to cover their face and be accompanied by a male relative in public. Those who broke the rules were sometimes humiliated or beaten by the Taliban’s moral police squads.

Since the Taliban seized the capital Kabul on Aug. 15, young Afghan women have staged protests in major cities, demanding their rights after the militants barred many from leaving their homes for work and girls from attending school or university.

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