UN Women Executive Director Sima Bahous emphasized that women should be included in the future of Afghanistan.
She reacted to the recent closure of the women’s beauty parlours and hairdressing salons and said this is another blow to women’s rights in the country.
Taliban announced on 4th July that all the women’s beauty salons in the country should be banned. They also specified in their order that the women’s beauty salons should be shut down on 23rd July, according to the moral ministry of the Taliban.
This is the latest restriction on Afghanistan’s access to public spaces, including banning from going to secondary schools, universities, gyms, baths, parks, and even working with aid agencies.
“The deadline for the closing of beauty parlours for women is one month,” Mohammad Sadiq Akif, a spokesperson for the Ministry for the Prevention of Vice and Propagation of Virtue, said on Tuesday, referring to a ministry notice.
Additionally, the ministry instructed the Kabul municipality to implement the most recent decision of the Taliban leader by revoking the licenses of women’s beauty parlours.
Meanwhile, Rina Amiri, the US envoy for Afghanistan’s women and girls’ rights, said, “The Taliban ban on beauty parlours removes another vital space for women’s work at a time when they are struggling to feed their families, eliminates one of the few refuges for women outside the home & further transforms the country into a cruel & extreme outlier in the world.”
In addition, the UN urged the Taliban to reverse the decree ban on women’s beauty salons immediately.
According to the Afghanistan Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the ban on beauty salons will leave around 60,000 women unemployed nationwide.
It also said there are over 12,000 women’s beauty parlours throughout the country, with an average of five women employed by each. There are 3,100 women-only beauty salons in Kabul. Only these ladies provide for their families needs financially.
Source: Khaama