Afghan Women

When the Taliban swept into Kabul on 15 August the only shots they fired were in celebration. For Afghan women, the salvos represented the loss of all their rights and freedoms. Five of them have been sending the BBC daily diaries, which provide a portrait of their rapidly changing lives.

15 August - 'Day of Judgement'


There's a scene in The Handmaid's Tale, the TV series based on Margaret Attwood's dystopian novel, where the main character, book editor June Osborne, arrives at her office one morning only to learn that the country's new leaders have banned women from the workplace.


Her boss gathers all the female staff and tells them to pack up their belongings and go home.


On 15 August 2021, Maari, a former soldier in the Afghan Army, has an almost identical experience. At 07:30, she leaves for work in a government ministry, expecting a busy day of meetings and conferences. Stepping outside, she immediately notices that the streets are eerily quiet, but she continues on her way, getting out her phone to check her calendar for meetings.


"You've come to work!" say astonished male colleagues when she walks in.


"I don't think Kabul is going to fall," she replies.


But she has barely put down her bag when her boss confronts her. "Go and tell all the women to go home," he says. She does as she's told, going from room to room telling female employees to leave right away. But when her boss asks her to go home, she refuses.


"As long as my male colleagues are staying and working, I am too," she says.


Maari's not just any member of staff. She's a high-ranking official with an impressive military record, and her boss reluctantly accepts what she says.


But as the day goes by, reports of the Taliban entering Kabul become impossible to ignore. Maari's boss decides to shut the ministry's doors and send everyone home.


Elsewhere in the city, Khatera, a geography teacher, is starting a new lesson - her 40 students, all teenage boys, flick through their books to find the right page.  READ MORE...