Taliban pepper-spray women as they take to the streets in Kabul

Taliban fighters confronted female protesters and doused them with pepper spray as they marched through Kabul demanding rights to work and education.

Dozens of women took to the streets yesterday with banners and posters against forced wearing of the hijab, harassment by the Taliban and the requirement of needing a male relative chaperone, or mahram, to be able to go out in public.

They also demanded justice for Zainab Abdullahi, who was shot dead at a Taliban checkpoint on Friday as she was returning from a wedding in the Afghan capital, and the release of a female prison officer who has been missing for several months.ideo unable

The faces of both Abdullahi and the officer, Alia Azizi, were printed onto banners being carried by the women. Azizi was the manager of Herat Prison before the Taliban swept to power last year, and a high-profile senior female official. She disappeared in October and her whereabouts remain unknown. Her son says she was arrested by the Taliban and is in Pul-e-Charkhi prison in Kabul.

In scenes witnessed by The Times, Taliban security forces arrived within minutes of the women starting their march outside Kabul University. Carrying automatic weapons, the fighters surrounded the women but allowed them to continue walking a few hundred metres.

However, a Taliban vehicle steered into the side of the group before one of the women slapped her hand down on the bonnet in anger and the car moved away. A gunman at the front of the demonstration sprayed pepper spray into the faces of several women before another pulled him away and sent him to the back of the group.

“When we were near [the university] three Taliban vehicles came, and fighters from one of the vehicles used pepper spray on us,” one protester, who asked not to be named for security reasons, said.

“My right eye started to burn. I told one of them ‘shame on you’, and then he pointed his gun at me.”

Two other protesters said that one of the women had to be taken to hospital after the spray caused an allergic reaction to her eyes and face.

One demonstrator wore a symbolic white burqa — the all-covering garment made mandatory for women during the Taliban’s previous rule — covered in red spray paint. The women claimed the idea of them having to cover up is not a part of Afghan culture.

One woman had shouted over a megaphone: “In the name of humanity, justice and equality . . . It has been five months that women in Afghanistan have protested to have justice and their right to work and attend school but, still, no one is paying attention to these things and every day the restrictions are increasing for women.

 “Taliban forces are not paying attention to their leaders,” screamed another, accusing fighters on the ground of harassing citizens. “We want these actions to be stopped. We want the Taliban to remove restrictions placed on women and to open the doors of schools for girls.”

The demonstration was dispersed by the Taliban fighters who arrived at the scene. Local elders joined the commotion, appealing for calm, talking to both the protesters and the Taliban.

While there has been no official policy regarding the wearing of the hijab or burqa, posters have been put up in Kabul encouraging women to do so, and women have told The Times that they have faced issues with the Taliban when travelling around the city without a mahram.

The Taliban announced on Saturday that they hoped to open schools for all girls by the end of March.

Fatima Mir, 23, was among yesterday’s demonstrators. “We want freedom, we want justice. When I leave my house on a day-to-day basis I feel scared, but in the protest I feel brave and powerful, to be able to raise my voice for other women who cannot,” she said.

“[Zainab Abdullahi] was killed three days ago. She was a woman who had a job and went out in public,” she said, suggesting there had been malice behind the shooting. Her death seems to be among a dangerous trend of accidental fatalities at the hands of the Taliban.

Zainab was on her way home to Dasht-e-Barchi, in the west of the city, from a wedding on Thursday evening with her sister, her young nieces and nephews and her brother-in-law who was driving the car.

During a mourning ceremony yesterday at a Shia mosque in the southwest of the city, Fatima Abdullahi, her 29-year-old sister, could barely whisper — her voice broken from days of emotional turmoil. She told The Times that the Taliban had warned her against talking to the media but she believes they need to be held accountable for her sister’s death.

Fatima explained her sister worked at FINCA bank, as does she, and was engaged. Zainab was due to get married in two months’ time.

 “We’d had such a lovely evening, dancing together, we were very happy. But at the checkpoint, the Taliban stopped the car and shone their torches in our faces,” she said. “The one Taliban said ‘OK you can go’, so my brother-in-law started to drive away and then they opened fire on us. My sister died in my arms.”

Fatima recalled the young Talib, aged about 17 or 18 she believes, appearing at the side of the car. “He was saying, ‘no, I didn’t shoot’ but you could see the bullet hole and the blood. There were four children in the car aged between 12 and two — they were in shock,” she said.

“The Taliban came to hospital and told us we shouldn’t go to the press. I just screamed at them that they had no right to shoot at us. They said: ‘It’s done now, you don’t need to raise your voice’. The man who did this should pay with his life.”

Although the Taliban have, publicly at least, vowed not to repress and harass women, concerns have been raised over incidents involving security forces on the ground, who often have little training.

On Saturday, a woman and child were fatally shot by the Taliban at a passport office in the eastern Laghman province. The reason behind the shooting is unclear.

Last month a 22-year-old man was shot dead at a Taliban checkpoint in Kabul. The Taliban member responsible was arrested but the family of the victim pardoned him.