INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE FOR THE DEFENCE OF AFGHAN WOMEN
Constitution of the
International Committee
for the Defence of Afghan Women
We, the delegates to the International Working Women’s Conference, held on 29 October 2022, having received the message of the Spontaneous Afghan Women’s Movement addressed to our conference, decide to form an International Committee for the Defence of Afghan Women who are demonstrating against the regime.
The message describes the persecution of Afghan women by the Taliban regime as well as the protests against the regime by women targeted by these attacks.
We hereby decide to make the message of our Afghan sisters widely known in our respective countries, in particular, the six demands that appear in the conclusion of this text (see below). In order to implement the demands they have put before us, we call on all women and men committed to the defence of democratic and women’s rights to join the international committee in order to organise the campaign.
The message of the
“Spontaneous Movement of Afghan Women”
to the International Conference of Working Women
October 28, 2022 Kabul
Today, Afghan women live under the most misogynistic regime, where they are deprived of all their human and civil rights. For this reason, Afghan women activists formed their own protest movement after the Taliban rule in August 2021, which has been organizing women’s protests in the cities of Kabul, Jalalabad, Herat, Mazar-e-Sharif and Bamiyan with the slogans (bread, work, freedom).
When women protest and demonstrate against the violation of their rights, the Taliban police brutally suppress them, beat them and threaten them with prison and death. (…)
Taliban intelligence identifies women activists and participants in demonstrations, arrests them during demonstrations, at the end of protests or later from their homes and imprisons and tortures them in their official or private prisons. (The new report of the United Nations September 2022 confirms the existence of private Taliban prisons and the torture of prisoners).
(…) It is not known how many women protestors and freedom fighters are imprisoned in the official and private prisons of the Taliban and in what condition they are. Because domestic and foreign human rights organizations and the families of prisoners do not have access to them.
(…) Some women who were released from Taliban prisons spoke of torture, sexual assault, threats to kill family members, lack of access to a lawyer, and lack of communication with family members.
In addition to dozens of women fighters and protesters who are in terrible Taliban prisons, or tens of others who have been killed by people affiliated with the Taliban (…), there are currently hundreds of other fighting women as socialist, secular, feminist, civil society activists, women’s rights defenders, journalists, teachers, university and high school students, and housewives under the prosecution of the Taliban and they are forced to live in hiding. (…) The lives of wanted protesting women are in serious danger.
Therefore, the demand of the « Spontaneous Movement of Afghan Women » from women fighters and progressive forces in France, Germany, America, and other countries of the world is as follows:
1. Forming an International Committee for the Defense of Afghan Women Protesters.
2. Requesting support from major international organizations defending women’s rights and human rights in order to identify women imprisoned in official and private Taliban prisons.
3. Launching an international campaign for the release of protesting women from Taliban prisons.
4. Lobbying for the protection of wanted and endangered women in Afghanistan.
5. Creating international women’s solidarity with women fighters in Afghanistan.
6. Collecting financial aid for the families of imprisoned and wanted women.
The International Committee to Defend Afghan Women was formed by:
Algeria: HAFSI Nadia;
Belgium : AIME Emilie, teacher; DARMONT Eléonore, student; K. Olga, social worker
Benin: GNONLONFOUN Liliane, trade unionist
Chile : LAPERTE Marcela, Independent Movement for the Rights of the People (MIDP)
France: KEISER Christel, POID national secretary; BAHLOUL Maïa, student, FJR (Federation of Young Revo- lutionaries); TIZZI Djemilla, trade unionist and POID member; MAS Nicole, member of the POID national bu- reau; ADOUE Camille, student, FJR member; LISCOËT Catherine, retired, member of the POID national bureau; DUPUY Martine, national secretary of the POID; MICHAUD Isabelle, CGT trade unionist; TEMPEREAU Lucile, young worker and POID member; SAUVAGE Jeanne, professor and researcher; FAURY Stéphanie, CGT-union officer at the Nemours hospital, South 77 Hospital Centre; ROUDIL Isabelle, trade union officer in social work; CORBEX Pascal, trade union officer in social work; FAUCHEUX Patrice, trade unionist; ANANOU Sarah; ANDERSON Amy; THRONE Stella;
Germany: ALBERT Lara, member of Die Linke, IG Metall trade unionist; SCHADE Vera, member of Die Linke;
Haïti: THELOT Myrlène, Haïti Liberté
Hungary : SOMI Judit, working-class activist;
Italy: GRILLI Monica, teacher, delegate and trade union leader; PANTELLA Agata, teacher;
Morocco: LAMINE Sakina;
Mexico: DIAZ CRUZ Maria de Lourdes, Movimiento Nacional por la Transformacion Petrolera; ORTEGA Marisela, Institute of political education of MORENA; PLUMEDA Liliana Aguilar, Internationalist Communist League; SUAREZ Lidia, Professor National Teachers University;
Pakistan: JAMIL Rubina, All Pakistan Trade Union Federation
Philippines : MIRANDA Judy Ann, Workers’ Party (PM);
Romania: CRETAN Marioara, League of Romanian Workers;
Spanish State : MARTIN Reme, retired, working-class activist;
United States : BACCHUS Natalia, assistant to the President, Baltimore Teachers Union (Maryland)*; BROWN Diamonte, President, Baltimore Teachers Union (AFT, AFL-CIO) (Maryland)*; KHONSARI Niloufar, lawyer and immigrant workers’ rights activist; KNOX Lisa, lawyer and immigrant workers’ rights activist; ROJAS Désirée, President of the Sacramento Chapter of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement (AFL-CIO); SHONE Mya, Socialist Organizer.
* in a personal capacity