UNITED NATIONS — The U.N. Security Council told Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers Monday that peace and prosperity are “unattainable” until they reverse their bans on women and girls getting an education, being employed and speaking in public.
The U.N.’s most powerful body also condemned ongoing terrorist activity in Afghanistan “in the strongest terms” and called for strengthened efforts to address the country’s dire economic and humanitarian situation.
The council resolution, adopted unanimously by its 15 members, extended the U.N.’s political mission in Afghanistan, known as UNAMA, until March 17, 2026.
The Taliban seized power in 2021 as U.S. and NATO forces withdrew following two decades of war. No country officially recognizes them as Afghanistan’s government because of their crackdown on women.
Not only are women barred from working, from many public spaces, and being educated beyond the sixth grade, but they must be fully veiled and their voices cannot be heard in public.
The Security Council called for the Taliban “to swiftly reverse these policies and practices.”
U.N. special envoy Roza Otunbayeva, the head of UNAMA, told the Security Council last week that it’s up to the Taliban to indicate whether they want Afghanistan to be reintegrated into the international system — “and, if so, whether they are willing to take the necessary steps.”
The Taliban’s chief spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, posted a statement on his official X account this month saying the dignity, honor and legal rights of women were a priority for the country, in accordance with Islamic law and Afghan culture and traditions. Islamic countries and religious scholars have said that denying women education and work is not part of Islamic law.
Otunbayeva said Afghans “increasingly resent the intrusions on their private lives” by Taliban officials and fear the country’s further isolation from the rest of the world.
“They have indeed welcomed an absence of conflict, and greater stability and freedom of movement, at least for the male population,” she said. “But this is not a peace in which they can live in dignity with their human rights respected and with confidence in a stable future.”
More than half of Afghanistan’s population — some 23 million people — need humanitarian assistance, a humanitarian crisis caused by decades of conflict, entrenched poverty, climate shocks and large population growth, Otunbayeva said. She said a downturn in funding is having a significant impact.
In the past month, the U.N. envoy said, more than 200 health facilities have been forced to close, affecting some 1.8 million people, including malnourished children.
On another major issue, the Security Council called on the Taliban to strengthen efforts to combat terrorism, condemning all terrorist activity in Afghanistan and demanding that the country not be used to threaten or attack any other country.
Relations between Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan have become strained since the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, which is allied with the Afghan Taliban, have increased attacks on security forces in Pakistan. At the same time, militants from the Afghan chapter of the Islamic State group, which opposes the Taliban, have carried out bombings across Afghanistan.