Women in Afghanistan: Pawns in men's power struggles

To mark the 20th anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the ensuing 20 years of war, Amnesty International is issuing six briefing papers covering a range of human rights issues in the country. It is urging the warring factions to end human rights abuses against the civilian population, and the international community to help end this human rights catastrophe. Although almost all Afghans have experienced or witnessed human rights abuses in the context of the war, the abuses appear to have gradually taken the form of a systematic targeting of groups on the basis of their identity, be they women, children, human rights defenders, members of minority groups, or refugees. Women - alongside civilian men and children - have been subjected to a catalogue of human rights abuses at the hands of the warring factions. In addition, they have become the targets of gender specific human rights abuses. Children have been denied their most basic rights - to health, education and family life - and all too often have themselves been targets. War, repression and neglect have devastated civil society, depriving Afghans of peaceful political activity and intellectual pursuits that are the very foundation of civil and institutional life. Tension along ethnic lines appears to have sharpened in recent years with grave abuses on grounds of ethnicity committed by the opposing factions. Cruel, inhuman or degrading punishments have been inflicted on victims after manifestly unfair trials. Over two million Afghan refugees are waiting for the warring factions in Afghanistan and the international community to establish respect for humanitarian law and human rights in the country and effective protection on return.