UN urges further improvement in women's rights in Afghanistan

The special rapporteur of the UN Commission on Human Rights on Violence against Women on Monday called upon the Afghan government to further improve women's living conditions and ensure their rights in the post-conflict country.

"I urge both the Afghan authorities and the international community to recognize that sacrificing respect for human rights, in particular women's rights to the claims of stability is not only falls short of UN founding principles, but also politically shortsighted," Yakin Erturk told reporters here.

At a press conference after a 10-day visit to Afghanistan, she stressed that Afghan women are still suffering at the hands of their husbands, in-laws, poverty and tradition in the post-Taliban nation.

"The there and half years since the fall of Taliban have seen considerable change in the legal and institutional framework concerning the situation of women in Afghanistan, however the violence against women remains dramatic in its intensity and pervasiveness, in public and private sphere of life," she stressed.

The former Taliban regime, during its six-year reign in major parts of Afghanistan, had banned girls from schools and confined women to homes.

Lashing out at forced and child marriage, the Turkish expert, who has been serving the United Nations as Special Rapporteur on violence against women since August 2003, urged the Afghan government to deal with the menace.

"Most of my interlocutors pointed to forced and child marriages as the primary source of violence against women," Erturk noted.

In parts of Afghanistan particularly in the remote-tribal areas, under-marriage-aged girls and even pre-birth marriages are common. Moreover, a widow cannot remarry other than the brother or close relatives of her husband in many parts of the country as tradition retains supremacy over the law.

Source: Xinhua