ICJ gender discrimination case: online responses

Feature image: X/@ZiaurahmanZala3

On 25 September 2024, The Guardian was briefed that Canada, Australia, Germany, and the Netherlands plan to file a lawsuit at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) against the Taliban for gender discrimination, under the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women (CEDAW), which was ratified by the former government of Afghanistan in 2003.

It is expected that Afghanistan, under the Taliban, will have six months to respond before the ICJ holds a hearing and potentially proposes provisional measures. Advocates believe that even if the Taliban rejects the court’s authority, a ruling by the ICJ against the group could deter other countries from normalising relations with them.

Anti-Taliban groups including the National Resistance Front (NRF), the Afghanistan Freedom Front (AFF), and the National Resistance Council for the Salvation of Afghanistan (NRCSA), as well as Afghan women rights activists, welcomed the initiative to hold the Taliban accountable on women’s rights.

In response to the report, Taliban Deputy Spokesman Hamdullah Fitrat dismissed allegations of discrimination against women as baseless in a 26 September 2024 post on X (formerly Twitter), which was subsequently reposted by Taliban Spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid.

Fitrat’s post reads: “The accusation by certain countries against the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan for human rights violations and gender discrimination is absurd. In Afghanistan, human rights are protected, and no one is discriminated against. Unfortunately, efforts are underway to spread propaganda against Afghanistan based on false information from a few women and make the situation look wrong.”

Pro-Taliban accounts on X responded to news of the lawsuit by launching a campaign aimed at promoting the Taliban’s narrative, while discrediting or downplaying claims about the deprivation of women’s rights in Afghanistan under Taliban rule. AW reviewed posts from various pro-Taliban accounts between 25 September and 1 October 2024, to analyse their response to the issue.

Several pro-Taliban accounts with thousands of followers posted videos of Afghan women working in both the public and private sectors, including police and businesswomen, to prove that women were not entirely absent from the system. They also shared a video of Deputy Prime Minister Mawlawi Abdul Kabir, from August 2024, claiming that 85,000 women were currently employed within the Taliban’s health, education, and security sectors.

Claiming that Islam grants true rights to women, and noting that Afghan women are currently secure, some pro-Taliban accounts shared a random video depicting the arrest of a woman by male policeman in America, as well as a photo showing a woman with a man who coloured himself like a dog, arguing that this is the kind of "freedom and rights" Westerners seek for Afghan women.

Omar Baryal, a Taliban propagandist with 65,000 followers on X, dismissed accusations of gender discrimination against the Taliban administration, claiming international organisations lack the moral authority to criticise them. He further argued that they should focus on addressing human rights violations in Palestine instead. Another pro-Taliban account, with nearly 12,000 followers, claimed that women in the West were treated as labourers and objects for satisfying the sexual desires of men.

Additionally, some pro-Taliban accounts shared videos of Afghan women and girls wearing hijabs, asserting that those living abroad and advocating for women’s rights in Afghanistan do not represent them. These accounts claimed that Afghan women were able to speak for themselves, and were content with the rights provided by the Taliban.

In one video shared by a pro-Taliban account with over 266,000 followers, a woman wearing hijab stated that Fawzia Koofi and Shukria Barakzai (former female Afghan parliamentarians), along with Aryana Saeed (a renowned female Afghan singer), have no authority to represent her or other Afghan Muslim women, despite their claims to do so. AW observed that this video was posted by hundreds of pro-Taliban accounts, including several with over 100,000 followers, and note that it was previously circulated by pro-Taliban accounts in March 2024.

Another video, where a pro-Taliban woman speaks in English and delivers the same message—that Afghan women abroad are not their representatives—was similarly posted by more than a hundred accounts, including prominent ones with tens of thousands to over 100,000 followers. The logo on the English-language video indicates that it was created and released by the pro-Taliban Uruj media channel, for the first time on 28 September 2024. 

Female pro-Taliban activist Hafiza Ayesha Emirati, along with several other pro-Taliban accounts using female names, actively contributed to the campaign by posting and reposting various content, including videos and photos.