The Left is calling for immediate humanitarian action and political responsibility in response to the situation in Afghanistan, especially for women and girls who are being systematically excluded from public life under Taliban rule.
The Left condemns ongoing negotiations between EU member states and the Taliban aimed at facilitating deportations, this is a betrayal of Europe’s human rights commitments. Twenty years of military intervention have demonstrated that war does not bring freedom or security. Instead, it has intensified violence and left behind deep social and economic devastation.
Left MEP Özlem Demirel (Die Linke, Germany) said in plenary: “Under the Taliban, women in Afghanistan are effectively excluded from public life, from education, from aid, and from medical care. There is a system of gender apartheid, and the situation is marked by crimes against humanity. What Afghan women and men need is humanitarian aid, negotiations to strengthen women’s rights, family reunification in Europe, and an end to deportations to Afghanistan.”
The Left is urging the European Union and its member states to put human rights and humanitarian principles at the centre of their engagement with Afghanistan. The Left also calls for sustained international pressure on the Taliban regime to restore access to education and work for women and girls and end this gender apartheid.
