The group’s supreme leader, Haibatullah Akhundzada, made a rare public address to thousands of clerics at an all-male gathering to discuss Afghanistan’s future. He traveled from his base in Kandahar to Kabul for the address, the first time he is known to have made that trip since the Taliban seized the Afghan capital last August. The cleric, who has never been filmed and is rarely photographed, effectively ruled out an inclusive government that could have drawn members from the ranks of former Taliban rivals and made no mention of women or girls. He described the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan as a “victory for Muslims around the world,” even though his government has not been recognized by any Muslim-majority country and many Muslim clerics inside and outside Afghanistan have denounced its harsher edicts. The meeting was closed to the media, but in an audio recording of the speech Akhundzada, a hardliner whose son was a suicide bomber, warned the international community not to get involved in Afghanistan. “Thank God we are now an independent country. [Foreigners] they should not give us their orders, it is our system and we have our own decisions,” he said, according to the official Bakhtar news agency. Diplomats from around the world have warned the Taliban that they must expand their rule and lift the most extreme controls on women’s lives if they want official recognition of their government. Girls in Afghanistan are now barred from secondary education and women cannot work in most sectors outside of health and education, need a male guardian for long-distance travel and have been ordered to cover their faces in public. Michelle Bachelet, the UN human rights chief, said on Friday that Afghan women and girls faced a “desperate situation”. Since the Taliban returned to power, “they are experiencing the most significant and rapid decline in the enjoyment of their rights across the board in decades,” he told the UN human rights council in Geneva. He urged the Taliban to look to other Muslim-majority countries, none of which ban girls from education, for a model for getting girls back to school. Universities and primary schools remain open to female students, albeit in strictly segregated classes, and the Taliban leadership has repeatedly stressed the need for female doctors, teachers and nurses. Many senior Taliban officials send their own daughters to the school. But plans to reopen girls’ secondary schools in March were abruptly canceled at the last minute. The Taliban, who have repeatedly acknowledged that women have a right to education under Islam, have never given a clear explanation for the closure. Analysts suggested the male clerics gathered in Kabul might discuss reopening girls’ schools, an issue that has divided the Taliban movement itself. Before the rally, the deputy prime minister said the men would speak for the women “because we respect them a lot”. Women’s education is one of the many issues that have caused rifts in the Taliban movement. The dominance of ethnic Pashtun Taliban leaders in the government has fueled frustration across Afghanistan and fears it could spark another round of civil war. Akhundzada effectively ruled out any inclusive government, saying that while former government officials should not fear reprisals, “forgiveness does not mean bringing them into government.” While this could leave the door open for the Taliban’s opponents to stay out of politics, many prominent community leaders had some sort of official role under former presidents Hamid Karzai and Ashraf Ghani. A narrow government may not only be a liability in seeking international support – the Taliban are already fighting armed insurgencies in the Panjshir Valley and, more recently, in the northern province of Sar-e Pul. Subscribe to the First Edition, our free daily newsletter – every morning at 7 p.m. BST In Sar-e-Pul, an ex-Taliban insurgent – one of the few commanders recruited from the ethnic Hazara community – has turned against the leadership. There have been reports of brutal killings of civilians in the campaign to put down his insurgency, prompting condemnation from human rights groups. “Amnesty International is gravely concerned by reports of summary executions and harm to civilians in the Balkhab district of Sar-e Pul province,” the organization said in a statement. “As the de facto authorities in Afghanistan, the Taliban have the primary responsibility to end attacks on civilians and ensure justice and accountability.”
