Life in Afghanistan after the Taliban took over

By Elena Siwoo Kim

On August 15th, 2021, the Taliban took over Afghanistan. It was exactly a few hours after Ashraf Ghani, the president of Afghanistan, fled the country. The Taliban co-founder, Abdul Ghani Baradar, took his place in the government palace. On the other hand, the citizens of Afghanistan flooded to the international airport in Kabul, where crowds scrambled to be part of the evacuations of foreign nationals and their Afghan allies.

Almost two months later, the Afghan people who still cannot evacuate from Afghanistan, are in a state of fear. Women and girls, especially, are unable to go outside of their homes due to the vicious threats from the Taliban. According to UN WOMEN, children and women make up close to half of all collateral casualties at the beginning of 2021, consisting of 46 percent of all civilian victims. Moreover, about 80 percent of one of four of a million people in Afghanistan, compelled to flee since the end of May, are women and children.

But it is not only women and children are having problems. Men are struggling to get jobs. More than half of the men in Afghanistan are in a state of fright - they cannot feed their families and afford the monthly rent. Additionally, in Panjshir province, the Taliban have pulled all males aged 10 to 65 from their houses and openly executed them on the road. Boys, as young as 10, have been killed just for existing. Majib, a man who lost his father to the Taliban, said he was “scared to go outside" because "they're beating people up every day".

The rulers of the Taliban have promised to respect women’s rights, forgive those men who fought on the government’s side, and ensure that Afghanistan does not become a haven for terrorists as part of a publicity attack aimed at relieving world powers and a fearful population. However, are their promises sincere?

The Taliban truly need to look back on what they have done to innocent women, children, and men in Afghanistan.