The women of Afghanistan have a lot more to fear from the Taliban than just wearing a burqa.
Speaking with Sky News, activist and former Afghan judge Najla Ayoubi alleged that the Taliban burned a woman for her alleged bad cooking.
“They are forcing people to give them food and cook them food. A woman was put on fire because she was accused of bad cooking for Taliban fighters,” said Ayoubi.
The incident allegedly took place on Thursday in the country’s northern region.
Ayoubi said she fled Afghanistan the moment it became apparent that the Taliban would come to power, emphasizing that young women across the country are being forced into sex slavery:
There are so many young women are being in the past few weeks being shipped into neighbouring countries in coffins to be used as sex slaves. They also force families to marry their young daughters to Taliban fighters. I don‘t see where is the promise that they think women should be going to work, when we are seeing all of these atrocities.
Earlier this week, the Associated Press reported that the Taliban have been putting up a more progressive front since coming to power by allowing girls to attend school and a female reporter to ask questions at a press conference, but those were merely superficial overtures.
“They have been starting to go door to door, checking people’ houses, sometimes forcing in. They are saying they are leaving the population alone, but that’s an indication that this is not true,” one Western female lecturer in Kabul, who wished to remain anonymous, told the Associated Press.
Last week, as the Taliban seized control of the country, spokesman Suhail Shaheen went as far as to say that reports of forcing underage girls into sex slavery is “poisonous propaganda.”
“All those claims that the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan forces people to marry their young girls to Mujahideen are totally wrong. It is a poisonous propaganda,” he tweeted.
As Breitbart’s Frances Martel noted earlier this week, the Taliban’s language of inclusivity has not in any way been reflected in their actions.
“Rather than the videos showing apparent calm in Kabul as Taliban leaders patrol the streets, the Islamic State published videos of “infidels” burned alive, beheaded, or otherwise tortured to death,” noted Martel.
Fawzia Koofi, a women’s rights activist and member of the Afghan delegation working to negotiate peace during the U.S. withdrawal, told NBC News that women will suffer a grisly fate under the Taliban:
Koofi and the provincial official said they had received reports that women were being made to “marry by force.” NBC News has not been able to verify the reports.
While she said she did not believe the practice was widespread, Koofi said that did not mean misconduct was not happening, adding that it was likely that the Taliban’s political office was “disconnected with their military fighters.”
She said she feared women would be “targeted” under Taliban rule. The militant group was “not afraid of the world’s superpowers,” she said, but it was “afraid of women.”
The Taliban have also reportedly begun targeting Christians in the country and are killing people with Bible apps on their iPhones.