Women and Post-2014 Afghanistan

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Women and Post-2014 Afghanistan: Report on Afghanistan Parliamentarians’ Visit to Brussels, a new report from the EastWest Institute, highlights the importance of protecting the rights of women in Afghanistan after the pullout of foreign troops.

Under the auspices of EWI’s Parliamentarians Network for Conflict Prevention and its work on women, peace and security, the delegation, two-thirds of them women, took part in high-level meetings in Brussels’ most prominent institutions. The Afghan delegation’s goal was to promote their role in international political bodies and to engage in discussions on peace and security with regard to the future of Afghanistan.

EWI’s Vice President and Ambassador-at-Large Beate Maeder-Metcalf declared: “With the planned troop withdrawal from Afghanistan coming up soon, it is vital that any political changes do not jeopardize the rights of women that are now mandated by the constitution.”

In their meetings, the visiting parliamentarians emphasized that even if the constitution were to be revised post-2014, the rights of women must continue to be explicitly guaranteed. “Women’s rights cannot be used as a bargaining chip with the Taliban,” the report asserted.

The visit of the parliamentarians took place from October 8-12, 2012. That same week, the Taliban tried to kill 14-year-old Malala Yousafzai in the Swat Valley. Yousafzai was shot in the head simply because she was standing up for the right of all girls to get an education. The attack exemplifies the brutality girls and women face as they struggle to secure their most basic freedoms in both Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The release of this report coincides with the 5th Anniversary of the Parliamentarians Network for Conflict Prevention, which mobilizes members in parliaments across the globe to find pioneering ways to prevent and end conflicts. For more information on the Parliamentarians Network for Conflict Prevention, please visit: www.pncp.info.