Afghan Women Worshiping in Mosques

March 4, 2006

Kabul –The Gulf Times reported that Women’s Minister Masooda Jalal has started a movement encouraging Afghan women to worship at mosques, something not traditionally done in the country. According to The Times, “Women in Afghanistan, whom the previous Taliban government banned from leaving their homes without a male escort, do not traditionally pray in mosques even though this is not specifically against Islam.”

Jalal took a group of 40 women to pray at Kabul’s Hazrat Ali mosque Friday, saying, “Some believe that the mosque should belong only to men but we want to make it gender sensitive.”

Afghan women have a long way to go in order to achieve gender sensitivity, much less gender equality. The report continued that “A UN rights report last year said women were still generally viewed as the property of men in Afghanistan and suffered widespread and persistent rights violations, including forced marriages, murder in the name of honor, and sexual and domestic violence.”

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