The Taliban administration in Afghanistan has ordered beauty salons to close within a month, the morality ministry said, in the latest shrinking of access to public places for Afghan women.
“The deadline for the closing of beauty parlours for women is one month,” Mohammad Sadiq Akif, a spokesman for the Ministry for the Prevention of Vice and Propagation of Virtue, said on Tuesday, referring to a ministry notice.
Foreign governments and UN officials have condemned growing restrictions on women since the Taliban returned to power in 2021 after defeating a US-backed government as foreign forces withdrew.
Last year, authorities closed most girls' high schools, barred women from university and stopped many female Afghan aid staff from working. Many public places including bathhouses, gyms and parks have been closed to women.
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Beauty salons sprung up in Kabul and other Afghan cities in the months after the Taliban were driven from power in late 2001, weeks after the September 11th attacks on the United States.
Many remained open after the Taliban returned to power two years ago, providing some women with jobs and their customers with their services. The salons are usually female-only and have their windows covered so that customers cannot be seen from outside.
Sahar, a Kabul resident who visited a salon every few weeks to get her hair and nails done, said she felt that a final avenue for socialising safely outside of with family had now been cut off.
"Parks are not allowed for women so it was a good place for us to meet our friends… it was a good reason to see each other, to meet other women, other girls to talk about issues," she said, asking that her full name not be published for security reasons.
"Now I don't know how to meet them, how to see them, how to talk to each other… I think it will be very impactful for us and women around Afghanistan," she said.
Western governments and international organisations have signalled that restrictions on women are hampering any possible progress to international recognition for the Taliban administration.
The administration says it respects women's rights in accordance with its interpretation of Islamic law and Afghan customs.
The United Nations on Tuesday said it was engaged with the authorities in Afghanistan to get the ban on beauty salons reversed. The UN mission in Afghanistan, or Unama, urged the Taliban to halt the edict.
“This new restriction on women’s rights will impact negatively on the economy and contradicts stated support for women entrepreneurship,” it said on Twitter.
One beauty salon owner said she was her family’s only breadwinner after her husband died in a 2017 car bombing. She did not want to be named or mention her salon for fear of reprisals.
Between eight to 12 women visited her Kabul salon every day, she said.
“Day by day they [the Taliban] are imposing limitations on women,” she said. “Why are they only targeting women? Aren’t we human? Don’t we have the right to work or live?” – Reuters/AP